The concept of "labor hoarding," at least in its modern form, was first fully articulated in the early 1960s by Arthur Okun (1963). By the end of the 20th century, the concept of "labor hoarding" had become an accepted part of economists' explanations of the workings of labor markets and of the...

Americans work more than Europeans. Using micro data from the U.S. and 17 European countries, we study the contributions from demographic subgroups to these aggregate level dierences. We document that women are typically the largest contributors to the discrepancy in work hours. We also document...

We incorporate a participation decision in a standard New Keynesian model with matching frictions and show that treating the labor force as constant leads to incorrect evaluation of alternative policies. We also show that the presence of a participation margin mitigates the Shimer critique.

We provide evidence regarding the dynamic behaviour of net labour flows across U.S. states in response to a positive technology shock. Technology shocks are identified as disturbances that increase relative state productivity in the long run for 226 state pairs, encompassing 80 per cent of...

The lack of comprehensive, international comparable wage data has been deplored for decades and has constrained the empirical analysis of wage growth and inequality. This is the case although, since 1924, the International Labor Organization (ILO) has conducted an October Inquiry to obtain data...

This paper uses a dynamic macro-micro framework to evaluate the potential distributional effects of the expansion of the Panama Canal. The results show that large macroeconomic effects are only likely during the operations phase (2014 and onwards), and income gains are likely to be concentrated...

We study the impact of active labour market policies (ALMPs) in the context of an applied general equilibrium model for the Dutch labour market. By using a calibrated general equilibrium model we try to narrow down the possible range of the net effect of various ALMPs. We consider the impact of...

This paper provides a review of the economic literature on social security systems and of practical experiences with building social security institutions. The focus is on the design of the institutions, and on the complicated relation between social security, economic welfare and economic...

Between 1982 and 2000, the Netherlands experienced a remarkable economie recovery. Labour participation rose from a European low of 52 percent to the European average of 65 percent. Unemployment decreased from a high of 14 percent to a present-day low of 2% percent, while government finances and...

In The Netherlands, the average exit rate out of welfare is dramatically low. Most welfare recipients have to comply with guidelines on job search effort that are imposed by the welfare agency. If they do not, then a sanction in the form of a temporarily benefit reduction can be imposed. This...