A popular explanation for the European unemployment problem is that relative wages have failed to adjust to changes in relative productivities. Many economists reject this hypothesis on the ground that the ratios of low- to high-skill unemployment have not increased. Building on a search model,...

With the aid of Norwegian register data, the paper investigates whether or not the relative unemployment propensity for the low-skilled has increased during the 1990’s. Two alternative notions of ‘low skills’ are employed; i) low education, and ii) low previous earnings, conditioned on...

We examine empirically the impacts of labor market policies - in terms of unemployment insurance (UI) and active labor market programs (ALMP) - on the duration and outcome of job search and on the quality of a subsequent job. We find that time invested in job search tends to pay off in the form...