Based on a survey of the literature, assesses the strength of the evidence regarding the effects of labour market institutions and regulations on unemployment. Considers the effects of employment protection, trade union density, bargaining coordination, unemployment benefits, the labour tax...

A rapidly expanding empirical literature has addressed the widely accepted claim that employment-unfriendly labor market institutions explain the pattern of unemployment across countries. The main culprits are held to be protective institutions, namely unemployment benefit entitlements,...

Inflexible labor markets are said to be the most important cause of economic stagnation and high unemployment rates. So certain are some advocates of this claim that casual observers might believe it is undisputed. These three economists show how flimsy the empirical support for such a claim...

This report debunks the myth that labor market protections, such as unions and unemployment benefits, are responsible for high European unemployment rates.

The paper shows that the growing employment gap between Europe and the USA over recent decades reflected the failure of services-employment rates in Europe to converge to American levels whilst European employment rates in goods production were falling rapidly towards those of the USA. The...

The widely held view that French economic performance is poor and that French employment performance is catastrophic, flies in the face of the evidence, according to this report.

This report examines one major source of bias in the yearly Current Population Survey -- nonresponse rates. It shows evidence of systematic undercounting due to the disproportionately high nonresponse rate from individuals who are less likely to be employed than the general population.

This report uses the past three recessions of the early 1980s, early 1990s and early 2000s to project the effects of a recession in 2008. The report finds that such a recession would result in a significant rise in unemployment and the poverty rate along with a significant decrease in the...

This report shows that official estimates of the number of Americans living in poverty and without health insurance may substantially underestimate the true number of poor and uninsured.