We reconsider the central role of the natural rate of unemployment (NRU) in forming policy decisions. We show that the … unemployment rate does not gravitate towards the NRU due to frictional growth, a phenomenon that encapsulates the interplay between … empirical analysis and find that the NRU explains only 33% of the unemployment variation, while frictional growth accounts for …

We distinguish and assess three fundamental views of the labor market regarding the movements in unemployment: (i) the … that all the short-run fluctuations automatically turn into long-run changes in the unemployment rate. We assert the …

fundamental role in shaping unemployment movements. This role has generally been examined by considering indirect transmission … single-equation unemployment rate models. Here we advocate a different approach. We directly estimate the effects of capital … stock in the labour market by applying the chain reaction theory of unemployment, and we find that capital stock is a major …

This paper views movements in unemployment as the result of the interaction between: (a) lags in labour market … decisions; and (b) labour market shocks with temporary and permanent components. Two features of unemployment dynamics are … examined: (i) `unemployment persistence', arising when temporary shocks have persistent effects on unemployment; and (ii …

This paper provides a critique of the "unemployment invariance hypothesis," according to which the behavior of the … labor market ensures that the long-run unemployment rate is independent of the size of the capital stock, productivity, and … equilibrating mechanisms to ensure unemployment invariance and that other markets may perform part of the equilibrating process as …

This paper evaluates two theories of unemployment: the natural rate theory (whereby unemployment is depicted as … fluctuating around a reasonably stable natural rate) and the chain reaction theory (which views movements in unemployment as the … unemployment not only in the short run, but in the long run as well. The reason is that, in the presence of growing exogenous …