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Search and Rest Unemployment

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Author Info
Fernando Alvarez
Robert Shimer

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Abstract

This paper extends Lucas and Prescott's (1974) search model to develop a notion of rest unemployment. The economy consists of a continuum of labor markets, each of which produces a heterogeneous good. There is a constant returns to scale production technology in each labor market, but labor productivity is continually hit by idiosyncratic shocks, inducing the costly reallocation of workers across labor markets. Under some conditions, some workers may be rest-unemployed, waiting for local labor market conditions to improve, rather than engaged in time consuming search. The model has distinct notions of unemployment (moving to a new labor market or waiting for labor market conditions to improve) and inactivity (enjoying leisure while disconnected from the labor market). We obtain closed-form expressions for key aggregate variables and use them to evaluate the model. Quantitatively, we find that in the U.S. economy many more people may be in rest unemployment than in search unemployment.

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Paper provided by National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc in its series NBER Working Papers with number 13772.

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Date of creation: Feb 2008
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Handle: RePEc:nbr:nberwo:13772

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Find related papers by JEL classification:
E24 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Macroeconomics: Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment - - - Employment; Unemployment; Wages; Intergenerational Income Distribution
J2 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demand and Supply of Labor
J6 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Mobility, Unemployment, and Vacancies

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References listed on IDEAS
Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
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  2. Atkenson, Andrew & Khan, Aubhik & Ohanian, Lee, 1996. "Are data on industry evolution and gross job turnover relevant for macroeconomics?," Carnegie-Rochester Conference Series on Public Policy, Elsevier, vol. 44(1), pages 215-239, June. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  6. Bentolila, Samuel & Bertola, Giuseppe, 1990. "Firing Costs and Labour Demand: How Bad Is Eurosclerosis?," Review of Economic Studies, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 57(3), pages 381-402, July. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  11. Chinhui Juhn & Kevin M. Murphy & Robert H. Topel, 1991. "Why Has the Natural Rate of Unemployment Increased over Time?," Brookings Papers on Economic Activity, Economic Studies Program, The Brookings Institution, vol. 22(1991-2), pages 75-142. [Downloadable!]
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  14. Fernando Alvarez & Marcelo Veracierto, 1999. "Labor market policies in an equilibrium search model," Working Paper Series WP-99-10, Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago. [Downloadable!]
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  15. Alvarez, Fernando & Veracierto, Marcelo, 2001. "Severance payments in an economy with frictions," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 47(3), pages 477-498, June. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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Cited by:
(explanations, Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.)

  1. Krueger, Alan B. & Mueller, Andreas, 2008. "Job Search and Unemployment Insurance: New Evidence from Time Use Data," IZA Discussion Papers 3667, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA). [Downloadable!]
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