This paper investigates whether firms innovate persistently or discontinuously over time using an innovation panel data set on German manufacturing and service firms for the period 1994-2002. We find that innovation behaviour is permanent at the firm-level to a very large extent. Using a dynamic...

Market clearing is the central issue in macroeconomics. Two centuries of debate on Say’s Law indicates that the issue is not yet settled. This essay proposes that double coincidence is a necessary condition for market clearing, in addition to the equality of demand and supply at equilibrium...

The framework of a general equilibrium heterogeneous agent model is used to study the optimal design of an unemployment insurance (UI) scheme and the voting behaviour on unemployment policy reforms. In a first step, the optimal defined benefit and defined replacement ratio UI systems are...

This paper investigates the dynamic consequences of demographic change and various pension reform scenarios for Austria. The analysis is based on a computable overlapping generations model with life-cycle labor supply, savings, and search unemployment. The public sector is decomposed into...

Extended unemployment benefits programs in the US are triggered by the state insured unemployment rate while intrastate demand conditions often vary dramatically. Some tight local labor markets may therefore exhibit a large adverse effect of extended unemployment benefits. Using a competing risk...

Based on administrative data from the federal employment office in Germany, we apply matching techniques to estimate the stepping-stone function of temporary agency work for the unemployed, i.e. its short-run and long-run effects on their future employment prospects. Our results show that...

This paper analyses the factors determining reservation wages in Estonia, and estimates the influence of the reservation wage on unemployment duration. According to estimations there is no statistically significant effect of unemployment benefit and social assistance on the reservation wage in...

The system of Unemployment Insurance (UI) financing in the US draws its funds from a payroll tax on employers and varies the tax rate according to the individual employer's layoff history. There exists extensive evidence on the effect of this so-called experience rated tax on layoff decisions....

This paper analyzes the effect of co-worker discrimination on wage and unemployment differentials between males and females using a search model. In the presence of asymmetric co- worker discrimination, no female-dominated firm emerges in the labor market. An increase in female participation...

In theory, employees may secure lasting employment if they have worked a long time early in their careers. [JEL J64]