Unemployment is notoriously difficult to predict. In previous studies, once country and year fixed effects are added to panel estimates, few variables predict changes in unemployment rates. Using panel data for 29 European countries collected by the European Commission over 444 months between...

How can today's workforce keep pace with an increasingly competitive global economy? As new technologies rapidly transform the workplace, employee requirements are changing and workers must adapt to different working conditions. This volume compares new evidence on the returns from worker...

In this speech, Professor David Blanchflower, member of the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC), of recent developments in the UK labour market on the wider economy and monetary policy. He argues that the equilibrium or natural rate of unemployment has fallen over the past decade, and posits a...

This paper draws attention to an increase in the size of the union membership wage premium in the UK public sector relative to the private sector. We find the public sector membership wage premium is approximately double that in the private sector controlling for a full range of individual, job...