A German policy experiment from 2012 allows me to identify the short-run and longrun causal effects of decentralization on the placement efficiency of public employment services (PES). I exploit variation over time and across districts with different types of PES in a difference-in-differences...

Unemployment insurance is a key tool for risk sharing and redistribution and also a prominent automatic stabiliser. It is a volatile spending item by design, which can lead to vulnerabilities. This paper explores various shocks and sources of vulnerability of the unemployment insurance schemes...

In a randomised controlled trial in Austria, lower caseloads in public employment offices led to more meetings of the unemployed with their caseworkers, more job offers, more program assignments, and more sanctions for noncompliance with job search requirements. More intensive counselling led to...

The paper uses the theoretical framework of the Spatial Economics to analyze (1) the regional unemployment disparities in Spain for males and females in three different age categories and for economic sector. We use administrative regional aggregate data to explore the distribution of the...