Most governments are mandated to maintain their economies at full employment. We propose that the best marker of full employment is the efficient unemployment rate, u*. We define u* as the unemployment rate that minimizes the nonproductive use of labor--both jobseeking and recruiting. The...

Over the past three decades, a large amount of research has attempted to identify the determinants of the natural rate of unemployment. It is this body of work we assess in this paper. We reach two main conclusions. First, there has been considerable theoretical progress over the past 30 years....

This paper begins by identifying nominal price stickiness as the logical basis for the Keynesian or activist point of view concerning demand management policy. It then characterizes two alternative approaches to policy analysis that have been adopted by adherents of the Keynesian position, the...