IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/cpr/ceprdp/16755.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Did The Australian JobKeeper Program Save Jobs by Subsidizing Temporary Layoffs?

Author

Listed:
  • Hunt, Jennifer
  • Borland, Jeff

Abstract

We analyze the JobKeeper lump-sum wage subsidy introduced by the Australian government in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, paying particular attention to the role of temporary layoffs in saving jobs. Although temporary layoffs were widely used, we find that recalls of workers on temporary layoff played only a small role in the early recovery. Of approximately 300,000 temporarily laid off, only about 100,000 were recalled in the initial months of recovery. In this time total employment grew by 440,000, reversing one-half of losses from the first months of the pandemic. This suggests either that temporary layoffs were very long, or that many workers on temporary layoffs were never recalled.

Suggested Citation

  • Hunt, Jennifer & Borland, Jeff, 2021. "Did The Australian JobKeeper Program Save Jobs by Subsidizing Temporary Layoffs?," CEPR Discussion Papers 16755, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    • Handle: RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:16755
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://cepr.org/publications/DP16755
    Download Restriction: CEPR Discussion Papers are free to download for our researchers, subscribers and members. If you fall into one of these categories but have trouble downloading our papers, please contact us at subscribers@cepr.org
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. James Bishop & Iris Day, 2020. "How Many Jobs Did JobKeeper Keep?," RBA Research Discussion Papers rdp2020-07, Reserve Bank of Australia.
    2. Rebecca Cassells & Alan Duncan, 2020. "JobKeeper: The efficacy of Australia’s first short-time wage subsidy," Australian Journal of Labour Economics (AJLE), Bankwest Curtin Economics Centre (BCEC), Curtin Business School, vol. 23(2), pages 99-128.
    3. Michael C. Burda & Jennifer Hunt, 2011. "What Explains the German Labor Market Miracle in the Great Recession," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 42(1 (Spring), pages 273-335.
    4. Lucia Foster & John C. Haltiwanger & C. J. Krizan, 2001. "Aggregate Productivity Growth: Lessons from Microeconomic Evidence," NBER Chapters, in: New Developments in Productivity Analysis, pages 303-372, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    5. Giupponi, Giulia & Landais, Camille, 2018. "Subsidizing labor hoarding in recessions: the employment and welfare effects of short time work," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 91708, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    6. Landais, Camille & Giupponi, Giulia, 2018. "Subsidizing Labor Hoarding in Recessions: The Employment & Welfare Effects of Short Time Work," CEPR Discussion Papers 13310, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Caroline Fyfe & Dave Maré & Phoebe Taptiklis, 2023. "COVID-19 Wage Subsidy: Outcome evaluation - Value for Money," Working Papers 23_04, Motu Economic and Public Policy Research.
    2. Lazzari, Ester & Reimondos, Anna & Gray, Edith, 2022. "Childbearing desires before and after the Covid-19 outbreak in Australia: Who changed their attitudes toward having a first or additional child?," SocArXiv qbgmp, Center for Open Science.
    3. Viet H. Nguyen & Tim Robinson & Sarantis Tsiaplias, 2022. "The Australian Economy in 2021–2022: The Virus Strikes Back," Australian Economic Review, The University of Melbourne, Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research, vol. 55(1), pages 5-24, March.
    4. Dean Hyslop & Dave Maré & Shannon Minehan, 2023. "COVID-19 Wage Subsidy: Outcome evaluation," Working Papers 23_03, Motu Economic and Public Policy Research.
    5. Timothy Watson & Paul Buckingham, 2023. "Australian Government COVID‐19 Business Supports," Australian Economic Review, The University of Melbourne, Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research, vol. 56(1), pages 124-140, March.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Jeff Borland & Jennifer Hunt, 2023. "JobKeeper: An Initial Assessment," Australian Economic Review, The University of Melbourne, Melbourne Institute of Applied Economic and Social Research, vol. 56(1), pages 109-123, March.
    2. Dengler, Thomas & Gehrke, Britta, 2021. "Short-Time Work and Precautionary Savings," IZA Discussion Papers 14329, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    3. Tomaz Cajner & Andrew Figura & Brendan M. Price & David Ratner & Alison E. Weingarden, 2020. "Reconciling Unemployment Claims with Job Losses in the First Months of the COVID-19 Crisis," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 2020-055, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    4. Kaboski, Joseph & Huneeus, Federico & Larrain, Mauricio & Schmukler, Sergio & Vera, Mario, 2022. "The Distribution of Crisis Credit: Effects on Firm Indebtedness and Aggregate Risk," CEPR Discussion Papers 17061, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    5. Werner Hölzl & Michael Böheim & Klaus S. Friesenbichler & Agnes Kügler & Thomas Leoni, 2021. "Staatliche Hilfsmaßnahmen für Unternehmen in der COVID-19-Krise. Eine begleitende Analyse operativer Aspekte und Unternehmenseinschätzungen," WIFO Studies, WIFO, number 66624, April.
    6. Michaillat, Pascal & Saez, Emmanuel, 2019. "Beveridgean Unemployment Gap," CEPR Discussion Papers 14132, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    7. Adermon, Adrian & Laun, Lisa & Lind, Patrik & Olsson, Martin & Sauermann, Jan & Sjögren , Anna, 2022. "Earnings losses and the role of the welfare state during the COVID-19 pandemic: evidence from Sweden," Working Paper Series 2022:20, IFAU - Institute for Evaluation of Labour Market and Education Policy.
    8. repec:hal:wpspec:info:hdl:2441/2ju03cb3kc9a3986bsibii70hd is not listed on IDEAS
    9. Bruno Ducoudre & Pierre Madec, 2020. "Évaluation au 6 mai 2020 de l'impact économique de la pandémie de COVID-19 et des mesures de confinement sur le marché du travail en France," SciencePo Working papers Main hal-03401434, HAL.
    10. Yusuf Mercan & Benjamin Schoefer, 2020. "Jobs and Matches: Quits, Replacement Hiring, and Vacancy Chains," American Economic Review: Insights, American Economic Association, vol. 2(1), pages 101-124, March.
    11. Veronica Guerrieri & Guido Lorenzoni & Ludwig Straub & Iván Werning, 2022. "Macroeconomic Implications of COVID-19: Can Negative Supply Shocks Cause Demand Shortages?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 112(5), pages 1437-1474, May.
    12. Marcin Kolasa & Michał Rubaszek & Małgorzata Walerych, 2019. "Are flexible working hours helpful in stabilizing unemployment?," NBP Working Papers 319, Narodowy Bank Polski.
    13. Daniel Kopp & Michael Siegenthaler, 2021. "Short-Time Work and Unemployment in and after the Great Recession [Does Employment Protection Inhibit Labor Market Flexibility? Lessons from Germany, France, and Belgium]," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 19(4), pages 2283-2321.
    14. Luca Citino & Andrea Linarello, 2022. "The impact of Chinese import competition on Italian manufacturing," Review of International Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 30(3), pages 702-731, August.
    15. David R. Agrawal & Aline Bütikofer, 2022. "Public finance in the era of the COVID-19 crisis," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 29(6), pages 1349-1372, December.
    16. Tito Boeri & Pierre Cahuc, 2022. "Labor Market Insurance Policies in the XXI Century," Post-Print hal-03878719, HAL.
    17. Carbonnier, Clément & Malgouyres, Clément & Py, Loriane & Urvoy, Camille, 2022. "Who benefits from tax incentives? The heterogeneous wage incidence of a tax credit," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 206(C).
    18. Simon Jäger & Benjamin Schoefer & Josef Zweimüller, 2023. "Marginal Jobs and Job Surplus: A Test of the Efficiency of Separations," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 90(3), pages 1265-1303.
    19. Koray Aktas, 2021. "Characterizing Life-Cycle Dynamics of Annual Days of Work, Wages, and Cross-Covariances," Working Papers 465, University of Milano-Bicocca, Department of Economics.
    20. Adams-Prassl, Abi & Boneva, Teodora & Golin, Marta & Rauh, Christopher, 2020. "Inequality in the impact of the coronavirus shock: Evidence from real time surveys," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 189(C).
    21. Julian Oliver Dörr & Georg Licht & Simona Murmann, 2022. "Small firms and the COVID-19 insolvency gap," Small Business Economics, Springer, vol. 58(2), pages 887-917, February.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Wage subsidy; Temporary layoffs; Jobkeeper; Covid-19;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • J08 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - General - - - Labor Economics Policies
    • J20 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor - - - General

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:16755. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: the person in charge (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.cepr.org .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.