This paper uses a unique Portuguese data set to examine the effect of unemployment benefit receipt and maximum duration of benefits on escape rates from unemployment. The focus is on the time profile of transitions out of unemployment. The novel aspect of the study resides in its identification...

This paper examines the determinants of unemployment duration in a competing risks framework with two destination states, namely, inactivity and employment. The major innovation is our recognition of defective risks. We first use a polynomial hazard function to test for the presence of...

This paper studies how changes in the two key parameters of unemployment insurance – the benefit replacement rate (RR) and the potential duration of benefits (PBD) – affect the duration of unemployment. In 1989, the Austrian government made unemployment insurance more generous by changing,...

This paper studies how changes in the two key parameters of unemployment insurance the benefit replacement rate (RR) and the potential duration of benefits (PBD) affect the duration of unemployment. In 1989, the Austrian government made unemployment insurance more generous by changing,...