Labour Market Institutions and Labour Market Performance in the European Union

The presented article deals with labour market institutions and labour market performance in the European Union. The first chapter is devoted to theoretical and methodological background of labour market performance. Theoretical literature has created a set of institutional aspects such as employment protection legislation, structure of wage bargaining, taxation of labour, active labour market policy, the system of unemployment and social benefits. All these aspects determine the institutional framework of labour market. Theoretical literature also has defined labour market flexibility as an instrument for adjustment process in case of asymmetric shock. Attention is also paid to influence of these institutional aspects on employment or unemployment. The second chapter is composed of the comparative analysis of selected criteria and corresponding economic indicators of the EU member states. The author has chosen the method of comparative analysis as the basic method for accomplishing the goal of the paper - to analyse the labour market institutions and their contribution to labour market performance in the EU member states. The evidence shows that the labour market flexibility in the Visegrad group countries is better than average of old EU-15 member states. However, this level of flexibility is much behind the level of USA or Anglo-Saxon countries. The main problem of Visegrad group is long-term unemployment and its composition and a lower level of employment. The author assumes that improving these indicators is one of the most important tasks for political-economic authorities.