We discuss and review literature on the macroeconomic effects of epidemics and pandemics since the late 20th century. First, we cover the role of health in driving economic growth and well-being and discuss standard frameworks for assessing the economic burden of infectious diseases. Second, we...

This paper addresses the design of the machinery of collective bargaining from the perspective of the needs of microeconomic and macroeconomic flexibility. In the former context, greater attention is given over to enterprise flexibility than external adjustment. In the latter context, close...

Much of the political economy analysis of reform focuses on the conflict of interest between groups that stand to gain or lose from the competing policy proposals. In reality, there is also a lot of disagreement about the working of the policy: in addition to conflicting interests, conflicting...

Cross-country employment differences are concentrated among women, the youth, and older individuals. In this paper, we document how worker flows between employment, unemployment, and out of the labor force vary by gender and age and contribute to aggregate employment differences across a large...

The current paper is a means of demonstrating our knowledge about macroeconomic theories, and its key variables, phenomena, and history. Given the key role that the Non-Accelerating Inflation Rate of Unemployment (NAIRU) has in the macroeconomic theory as well as its role in determining...

The current paper is a means of demonstrating our knowledge about macroeconomic theories, and its key variables, phenomena, and history. Given the key role that the Non-Accelerating Inflation Rate of Unemployment (NAIRU) has in the macroeconomic theory as well as its role in determining...

Much of the political economy analysis of reform focuses on the conflict of interest between groups that stand to gain or lose from the competing policy proposals. In reality, there is also a lot of disagreement about the working of the policy: in addition to conflicting interests, conflicting...

This paper proposes a new approach to evaluate the macroeconomic effects of the Hartz IV reform in Germany, which reduced the generosity of long-term unemployment benefits. We use a model with different unemployment durations, where the reform initiates both a partial effect and an equilibrium...

Our paper analyzes the role of public employment agencies in job matching, in particular the effects of the restructuring of the Federal Employment Agency in Germany (Hartz III labor market reform) for aggregate matching and unemployment. Based on two microeconomic datasets, we show that the...

Prior to 2020, the Great Recession was the most important macroeconomic shock to the United States economy in generations. Millions lost jobs and homes. At its peak, one in ten workers who wanted a job could not find one. On an annual basis, the economy contracted by more than it had since the...