Randomized experiments provide policy relevant treatment effects if there are no spillovers between participants and nonparticipants. We show that this assumption is violated for a Danish activation program for unemployed workers. Using a difference-in-difference model we show that the...

Based on new, exceptionally informative and large German linked employer-employee administrative data, we investigate the question whether the omission of important control variables in matching estimation leads to biased impact estimates of typical active labour market programs for the...

This paper studies the role of job search assistance programs in optimal welfare-to-work programs. The analysis is based on a framework, that allows for endogenous choice of benefit types and levels, wage taxes or subsidies, and activation measures such as monitoring and job search assistance...

Since July 2004 the job search effort of long-term unemployed benefit claimants is monitored in Belgium. We exploit the discontinuity in the treatment assignment at the age of 30 to evaluate the effect of a notification sent at least 8 months before job search is verified. The threat of...

When workers send applications to vacancies they create a network. Frictions arise if workers do not know where other workers apply to (this affects network creation) and firms do not know which candidates other firms consider (this affects network clearing). We show that those frictions and the...

We examine the matching process using monthly panel data for local labour markets in Sweden. We find that an increase in the number of vacancies has a weak effect on the number of unemployed workers being hired: unemployed workers appear to be unable to compete for many available jobs. Vacancies...

We build and estimate a non-stationary structural job search model that incorporates the main stylized features of a typical job search monitoring scheme in unemployment insurance (UI) and acknowledges that search effort and requirements are measured imperfectly. Based on Belgian data,...

We structurally estimate an equilibrium search model using German administrative data and use this for counterfactual analyses of a uniform minimum wage. The model with worker and firm heterogeneity does not restrict the sign of employment effects a priori and allows for different job offer...

We conduct a large-scale field experiment in the German labor market to investigate how information provision affects job seekers' employment prospects and labor market outcomes. Individuals assigned to the treatment group of our experiment received a brochure that informed them about job search...

This paper develops a new equilibrium model of two-sided search where agents have multiple attributes and general payoff functions. The model can be applied to several substantive issues. Here we use it to provide a novel understanding of the separate effects of equal opportunities for women in...