Employing a standard matching unemployment model extended by within-labor-market-regions commuting, this paper analyzes the tradeoff between commuting costs and unemployment. Depending on whether commuters are able to bargain for fringe benefits, search may or may not be biased towards distant...

The economic downturn in 2007 has led to a very spectacular rise in unemployment in some countries, especially concentrated among low educated and young men. Facing this new context, the reactions of labour market policies seem ambiguous. On the one hand, institutional reforms and in work...

The fiscal sustainability of state pensions is a central concern of policymakers in nearly every advanced economy. Policymakers have attempted to ensure the sustainability of these programs in recent decades by raising retirement ages. However, there are concerns that keeping older workers in...

The historic decision at the Euro Summit on July 12, 2015, to continue supporting Greece as a member of the EU and the euro family, provided Greece the chance to return to growth and sustainability, provided it takes the necessary steps to continue with its reforms. Jointly the Greek government...

This paper has three primary objectives. First, it provides a broad overview of the available South African data used to examine gender in the labour market, with specific reference to the South African Revenue Services (SARS) tax data which has recently been made available. Second, the paper...

The aim of this paper is to measure the effect of the interaction between age for the population of males and females aged 18 to 74 and region-level GDP per capita on labour market transition probabilities in Italy. We compare different occupational states in a sample of males and females who...

Activation policies aimed at getting working-age people off benefits and into work have been embraced by many OECD countries. In a previous paper, I have argued that activation strategies have performed well during the Great Recession and subsequent recovery in some, but not all, of these...

This paper assesses the impact the Great Recession had on individuals' transitions to and from unemployment in Ireland. The rate of transition from unemployment to employment declined between 2006 and 2011, while the rate from employment to unemployment increased. The results indicate that young...

This paper evaluates the impact of a reduction in the child qualifying age criteria for the One Parent Family Payment (OFP) in Ireland. From 2012 to 2015, the child qualifying age for OFP was reduced from 18 years to 7 years. Lone parents who no longer qualified for the payment, based on the age...

This paper evaluates the impact of a vocational training programme on the labour market outcomes of unemployed youth in Latvia. The programme is part of the Youth Guarantee scheme for the period 2014-2020, the largest action launched by the European Union to reduce youth unemployment rate and to...