A phenomenon observed in many labor markets is that the supply of labor appears to depend on business cycles. In other words, workers who are searching for work become "discouraged" under unfavorable business cycle conditions because they believe that their chances of finding an acceptable job...

In this paper we analyze labor force participation with particular reference to the discouraged worker effect. The theoretical point of departure is a simple model where the worker evaluates the expected utility of searching for work, and decides to participate in the labor market if the...

This paper analyzes labor force participation with particular reference to the discouraged worker effect. Discouraged workers are those who do not search for work because they view their chances of finding a suitable job as too low. The theoretical point of departure is a search model where the...

Die Arbeit untersucht, wie stabil die Ergebnisse der jüngst vom Institut für Arbeitsmarkt- und Berufsforschung veröffentlichten Berechnungen zur Stillen Reserve für den Zeitraum von 1970 bis 2002 hinsichtlich der zentralen Modellannahme über die Höhe der Vollbeschäftigung sind. Dazu...

This paper measures the job-search responses to the COVID-19 pandemic using realtime data on vacancy postings and ad views on Sweden's largest online job board. First, the labour demand shock in Sweden is as large as in the US, and affects industries and occupations heterogeneously. Second, the...

This paper measures the job-search responses to the COVID-19 pandemic using realtime data on vacancy postings and job ad views on Sweden's largest online job board. First, new vacancy postings drop by 40%, similar to the US. Second, job seekers respond by searching less intensively, to the...

We use a novel approach to studying the heterogeneity in the job finding rates of the nonemployed by classifying the nonemployed by labor force status (LFS) histories, instead of using only one-month LFS. Job finding rates differ substantially across LFS histories: they are 25-30% among those...

Eine Reform des Arbeitsmarktes ist überfällig. Im Verlaufe des Jahres 2002 sind dazu mehrere grundlegende Vorschläge vorgelegt worden - unter anderem vom ifo Institut, der Hartz-Kommission und vom Sachverständigenrat -, die das Instrument der Leiharbeit nutzen wollen, um Arbeitlose in den...

Contrary to much of the established literature, this paper finds that though many older workers would prefer to reduce their working hours (the overemployed), there is a significant group who would like to work longer hours (the underemployed). And contrary to the assumption that the...

Discouraged workers are those who have given up search due to (perceived) low chances of obtaining work. In this paper we first develop a model for the probability of being in the labor force as a function of the probability of getting an acceptable job offer. This model is based on standard...