This chapter surveys the contributions of laboratory experiments to labor economics. We begin with a discussion of methodological issues: when (and why) is a lab experiment the best approach; how do laboratory experiments compare to field experiments; and what are the main design issues? We then...

Finland is committed to high quality and extensive public services and a high level of income redistribution. The heavy tax burden these commitments require is becoming increasingly difficult to sustain due to tax competition and the need to harmonise certain taxes with other EU countries. These...

Most countries exhibit large and persistent geographical differences in wages, income and unemployment rates. A growing class of "place based" policies attempt to address these differences through public investments and subsidies that target disadvantaged neighborhoods, cities or regions. Place...

Health care systems are financed through a mixture of different components: taxes, contributions to social health insurance, premiums to private health insurance, out of pocket payments by patients. These components can be combined differently leading to specific effects of interpersonal...

To the layperson, the upward trend in European unemployment is related to the slowdown in economic growth. We argue that the layperson’s view is correct. The increase in European unemployment and the slowdown in economic growth are related because they stem from a common cause: an excessively...

This paper builds, identifies and estimates a model of the labor market that features strategic interactions in wage setting and two-sided heterogeneity in order to shed light on the sources of wage inequality. We provide a tractable characterization of the model equilibrium and demonstrate its...

I generalize the canonical model--in which relative supply and demand for worker skills shape the skill premium--incorporating monopsony power, minimum wages, and unemployment. I estimate the extended canonical model using national data and, separately, state-level data. I show that...

This paper develops the nonparametric identification of models with production complementarities, worker-firm specific disutility of labor and search frictions. Mobility in the model is subject to preference shocks, and we assume that firms can write wage contracts. We develop a constructive...

This chapter, prepared for the Handbook of Labor Economics, presents a comprehensive overview of how labor economists understand job search among the unemployed and how job search is shaped by unemployment insurance (UI) and active labor market policies (ALMP). It focuses on synthesizing key...

This chapter examines government policy alternatives for protecting the environment. We compare environmentally motivated taxes and various non-tax environmental policy instruments in terms of their efficiency and distributional impacts. Much of the analysis is performed in a second-best setting...