not the case. Although unemployment is low, the labor market is not 'tight'. On the contrary, we show that what matters …

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 … just over 10000 observations, we predict changes in the unemployment rate 12 months ahead. We do so using individuals …