This paper investigates the age-dependency of participation andunemployment by integrating job search with intertemporal optimizing behaviorof finitely-lived households. We find that search frictions and tax ratesdistort the decisions of older workers to a much larger extent than that ofyoung...

We analyze a general search model with on-the-job search and sorting of heterogeneous workers into heterogeneous jobs. This model yields a simple relationshipbetween (i) the unemployment rate, (ii) the value of non-market time, and (iii) themax-mean wage differential. The latter measure of wage...

This paper studies the relevance of social interactions among the unemployed. Identification is based on a salient and selective extension of the potential duration of unemployment benefits. If social interactions are important, this policy change affects entitled individuals not only directly,...

This paper examines the relationship between entrepreneurship (as measured by fluctuations in the business ownership rate) and unemployment in Japan for the period between 1972 and 2002. We find that, although Japan’s unemployment rate has been influenced by specific exogenous shocks, the...