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Rodríguez-Soler, Joan & Joan Miquel Verd (2023): Informal social capital building in local employment services: Its role in the labour market integration of disadvantaged young people. In: Social Policy and Administration, Jg. 57, H. 5, S. 679-699. DOI:10.1111/spol.12900

Abstract

"This article focuses on the role that local employment services (LES) play in informal social capital building for young people with a disadvantaged social background. The personal networks of these young people usually embed few useful resources for labour market integration, and LES actions may be an opportunity to informally build a network of contacts with better resources. To explore this possibility, biographical interviews were conducted with 24 young adults who used LES actions, and their employment trajectories were analysed. The findings highlight that these actions—especially those consisting of training or internships—provide social capital that is useful for labour market (re)integration. Linking social capital is the type of social capital that is most useful for job seeking, and it is especially effective in non-metropolitan rural areas." (Author's abstract, IAB-Doku, Published by arrangement with John Wiley & Sons) ((en))

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Aumond, Romain, Valerio Di Tommaso & Gerhard Rünstler (2022): A narrative database of labour market reforms in euro area economies. (Working paper series / European Central Bank 2657), Frankfurt am Main, 61 S.

Abstract

"We present a quarterly narrative database of important labour market reforms in selected euro area economies in between 1995 and 2018 covering 60 events. We provide legal adoption and implementation dates of major reforms to employment protection legislation and unemployment benefits. Estimates based on local projections find negative short-run effects of liberalising reforms on wages, while the employment effects of reforms differ markedly across age groups and partly depend on the state of the economy." (Author's abstract, IAB-Doku) ((en))

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Bertheau, Antoine, Edoardo Acabbi, Cristina Barceló, Andreas Gulyas, Stefano Lombardi & Raffaele Saggio (2022): The Unequal Cost of Job Loss across Countries. (IZA discussion paper 15033), Bonn, 49 S.

Abstract

"We document the consequences of losing a job across countries using a harmonized research design. Workers in Denmark and Sweden experience the lowest earnings declines following job displacement, while workers in Italy, Spain, and Portugal experience losses three times as high. French and Austrian workers face earnings losses somewhere in-between. Key to these differences is that Southern European workers are less likely to find employment following displacement. Loss of employer-specific wage premiums accounts for 40% to 95% of within-country wage declines. The use of active labor market policies predicts a significant portion of the cross-country heterogeneity in earnings losses." (Author's abstract, IAB-Doku) ((en))

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Ferragina, Emanuele & Federico Danilo Filetti (2022): Labour market protection across space and time: A revised typology and a taxonomy of countries' trajectories of change. In: Journal of European Social Policy, Jg. 32, H. 2, S. 148-165. DOI:10.1177/09589287211056222

Abstract

"We measure and interpret the evolution of labour market protection across 21 high-income countries over three decades, employing as conceptual foundations the ‘regime varieties’ and ‘trajectories of change’ developed by Esping-Andersen, Estevez-Abe, Hall and Soskice, and Thelen. We measure labour market protection considering four institutional dimensions – employment protection, unemployment protection, income maintenance and activation – and the evolution of the workforce composition. This measurement accounts for the joint evolution of labour market institutions, their complementarities and their relation to outcomes, and mitigate the unrealistic Average Production Worker assumption. We handle the multi-dimensional nature of labour market protection with Principal Component Analysis and capture the characteristics of countries’ trajectories of change with a composite score. We contribute to the literature in three ways. (1) We portray a revised typology that accounts for processes of change between 1990 and 2015, and that clusters regime varieties on the basis of coordination and solidarity levels, that is, Central/Northern European, Southern European, liberal. (2) We illustrate that, despite a persistent gap, a large majority of Coordinated Market Economies experiencing a decline in the level of labour market protection became more similar to Liberal Market Economies. (3) We develop a fivefold taxonomy of countries’ trajectories of change (liberalization, dualization, flexibility, de-dualization and higher protection), showing that these trajectories are not always path-dependent and consistent with regime varieties previously developed in the literature." (Author's abstract, IAB-Doku) ((en))

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Mato-Díaz, Fco Javier & María Miyar-Busto (2021): Exit from open-ended social benefits into employment: Access to work, active labour market policies and work intensity. In: Social Policy and Administration, Jg. 55, H. 7, S. 1293-1309. DOI:10.1111/spol.12726

Abstract

"An analysis is made of the sensitivity of minimum income schemes to the effects of labour market participation and active labour market services. Data comes from the only regional scheme in Spain that has an open-ended duration and has existed for a period long enough to be analysed. This scheme shows the closest resemblance with the first national minimum income programme, introduced by the Spanish government in 2020 (Ingreso Mínimo Vital). Survival analysis results show that people who access full-time work contracts have a higher probability of exiting into employment than those who do not, although the majority of people who sign at least one contract remain in the scheme, nevertheless. A defining element for exiting the scheme is work intensity. Thus, despite the fact that the scheme is compatible with some jobs, results suggest that increasing the compatibility between work and benefit would be a crucial factor in facilitating exit from the scheme. In addition, analyses of the elements defining the probability of signing a work contract while on the benefit show that active labour market policies heighten said probability, but do not subsequently influence exit from the scheme." (Author's abstract, IAB-Doku, Published by arrangement with John Wiley & Sons) ((en))

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Herrero, Daniel, Luis Cárdenas & Julián López Gallego (2020): Does deregulation decrease unemployment? An empirical analysis of the Spanish labour market. In: International Labour Review, Jg. 159, H. 3, S. 367-396. DOI:10.1111/ilr.12179

Abstract

"Spain underwent two major labour reforms in 2010 and 2012 under the assumption that deregulating the labour market and decentralizing collective bargaining would automatically reduce unemployment (deregulation hypothesis). This article highlights the impact of demand and the sectoral structure of the economy to explain the behaviour of this variable (structural hypothesis). Analysing subnational panel data, the authors assess the capacity of these two hypotheses to explain unemployment trends. Their results cast doubt on the deregulation hypothesis and indicate the importance of cyclical and structural factors." (Author's abstract, IAB-Doku, Published by arrangement with John Wiley & Sons) ((en))

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Benda, Luc, Ferry Koster & Romke van der Veen (2019): Levelling the playing field? Active labour market policies, educational attainment and unemployment. In: The International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy, Jg. 39, H. 3/4, S. 276-295. DOI:10.1108/IJSSP-08-2018-0138

Abstract

"The purpose of this paper is to investigate how active labour market policy (ALMP) training programmes and hiring subsidies increase or decrease differences in the unemployment risk between lesser and higher educated people during an economic downturn. A focus is put on potential job competition dynamics and cumulative (dis)advantages of the lesser and higher educated" (Author's abstract, © Emerald Group) ((en))

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Bown, Chad P. & Caroline Freund (2019): Active labor market policies. Lessons from other countries for the United States. (Working paper / Peterson Institute for International Economics 2019-02), Washington, DC, 12 S.

Abstract

"US labor force participation has been weak in recent decades, especially during the recovery of the financial crisis of 2007 - 09. This paper examines several programs that governments in other advanced industrial countries have established to help jobless workers continue to seek employment, not drop out of the labor force, and ultimately find jobs. These programs more actively support out-of-work citizens by facilitating matches between workers and firms, helping workers in their job searches, and sometimes creating jobs when none are available in the private sector. The evidence presented in this paper concludes that job placement services, training, wage subsidies, and other labor adjustment policies can be used to successfully help workers find employment and remain tied to the labor market. By contrast, direct job creation through public works projects and other government programs are less effective in helping workers over the long run." (Author's abstract, IAB-Doku) ((en))

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Gehrke, Britta & Enzo Weber (2018): Reforming the labor market in good and bad times: Any differences? In: N. F. Campos, P. De Grauwe & Y. Ji (Hrsg.) (2018): The political economy of structural reforms in Europe, S. 101-115, 2018-02-09. DOI:10.1093/oso/9780198821878.003.0005

Abstract

"This chapter discusses how the effects of structural labour market reforms depend on whether the economy is in expansion or recession. Based on an empirical time series model with Markov switching that draws on search and matching theory, we propose a novel identification of reform outcomes and distinguish the effects of structural reforms that increase the flexibility of the labour market in distinct phases of the business cycle. We find in applications to Germany and Spain that reforms which are implemented in recessions have weaker expansionary effects in the short run. For policymakers, these results emphasize the costs of introducing labour market reforms in recessions." (Author's abstract, IAB-Doku) ((en))

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González-Alegre, Juan (2018): Active labour market policies and the efficiency of the European Social Fund in Spanish regions. In: Regional Studies. Journal of the Regional Studies Association, Jg. 52, H. 3, S. 430-443.

Abstract

"In diesem Beitrag werden die Determinanten von staatlichen Ausgaben für aktive Arbeitsmarktpolitik auf regionaler Ebene mithilfe der Paneldaten einer Stichprobe von 17 spanischen Regionen (1989 - 2010) untersucht. Bei den Schätzungen werden die Endogenität, die Dynamik und die räumliche Abhängigkeit zwischen Regionen berücksichtigt. Die Ergebnisse der Schätzungen werden mithilfe eines einfachen theoretischen Modells von Finanzausgleichszahlungen interpretiert. Aus den Ergebnissen geht hervor, dass der Europäische Sozialfonds das Ziel der Förderung von Ausgaben für aktive Arbeitsmarktpolitik nicht wirksam erreicht und dass Rent-Seeking beim Wettbewerb zwischen Regionen zum Erhalt von Mitteln aus einem gemeinsamen Pool das Gegenteil bewirkt, was sich im Fall von Imitationen noch verschlechtert." (Autorenreferat, IAB-Doku)

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Martín Román, Ángel L., Jaime Cuéllar-Martín & Alfonso Moral de Blas (2018): Labor supply and the business cycle: The "Bandwagon Worker Effect". (GLO discussion paper / Global Labor Organization 274), Maastricht, 30 S.

Abstract

"The relationship between the labor force participation and the business cycle has become a topic in the economic literature. However, few studies have considered whether the cyclical sensitivity of the labor force participation is influenced by 'social effects'. In this paper, we construct a theoretical model to develop the 'Added Worker Effect' and the 'Discouraged Worker Effect', and we integrate the 'social effects', coining a new concept, the Bandwagon Worker Effect (BWE). To estimate the cyclical sensitivity of the labor force participation, we employ a panel dataset of fifty Spanish provinces for the period 1977-2015. Finally, we use spatial econometrics techniques to test the existence of the BWE in the local labor markets in Spain. Our results reveal that there exists a positive spatial dependence in the cyclical sensitivity of the labor force participation that decreases as we fix a laxer neighborhood criterion, which verifies the existence of the BWE. From the perspective of economic policy, our work confirms that 'social effects' play a key role at the time of determining the economic dynamics of the territories." (Author's abstract, IAB-Doku) ((en))

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Murtin, Fabrice & Jean-Marc Robin (2018): Labor market reforms and unemployment dynamics. In: Labour economics, Jg. 50, H. March, S. 3-19. DOI:10.1016/j.labeco.2016.05.025

Abstract

"We quantify the contribution of labor market reforms to unemployment dynamics in nine OECD countries (Australia, France, Germany, Japan, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, UK, US). We estimate a dynamic stochastic search-matching model with heterogeneous workers and aggregate productivity shocks. The heterogeneous-worker mechanism proposed by Robin (2011) explains unemployment volatility by productivity shocks well in all countries. Placement and employment services, UI benefit reduction and product market deregulation are found to be the most prominent policy levers for unemployment reduction. Business cycle shocks and LMPs explain about the same share of unemployment volatility (except for Japan, Portugal and the US)." (Author's abstract, © 2016 Elsevier) ((en))

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Gialis, Stelios & Lila Leontidou (2016): Antinomies of flexibilization and atypical employment in Mediterranean Europe. Greek, Italian and Spanish regions during the crisis. In: European Urban and Regional Studies, Jg. 23, H. 4, S. 716-733. DOI:10.1177/0969776414538983

Abstract

"Until recently, Mediterranean countries were called on by European Union officials to provide for a 'less-rigid' regulatory framework, in order to enhance 'flexicurity'. This paper critically examines post-2008 flexibilization trends by focusing on Spanish, Italian and Greek regions. Starting from a contextualization of atypical employment and security, it then moves in a twofold direction; firstly, it presents the Flexible Contractual Arrangements and Active Labour Market Policies composite indicators, calculated for the NUTS-II regions of 12 member states for 2008 and 2011. These indicators reveal the changing ranking, especially of the Greek regions, towards higher labour market flexibility and relatively low levels of employability security; secondly, it focuses on the changing forms of atypical labour in the six regions that host the capital and the most important port city of Greece, Italy and Spain, respectively, by offering data on the expansion of flexible arrangements therein. The uneven flexibilization trends found in the study regions are seen as an outcome of the interaction between the general devaluation trends, different backgrounds and regionally specific patterns of labour market adjustment, while employment is found to be neither 'rigid' nor 'flexicure'. The paper concludes with some remarks on the relation between post-2008 dismantling of local labour regimes, restructuring and flexicurity." (Author's abstract, IAB-Doku) ((en))

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Arranz, José María, Carlos García Serrano & Virginia Hernanz (2013): Active labour market policies in Spain. A macroeconomic evaluation. In: International Labour Review, Jg. 152, H. 2, S. 327-348. DOI:10.1111/j.1564-913X.2013.00182.x

Abstract

"Using aggregate panel data on Spain's 17 regions for the period 1987 - 2010, the authors present a macroeconomic assessment of a variety of active labour market policies, including employment subsidies for permanent contracts, job-creation schemes and vocational training programmes. Their results suggest that employment subsidies for permanent contracts had no notable effect on aggregate levels of permanent or temporary employment. However, they do appear to have had a small positive effect on transitions from unemployment to employment, and from temporary to permanent employment, particularly since the 1997 labour reform. Better targeted subsidies, the authors conclude, would have incurred fewer deadweight and substitution effects." (Author's abstract, IAB-Doku) ((en))

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Ayala, Luis & Magdalena Rodriguez (2013): Evaluating social assistance reforms under programme heterogeneity and alternative measures of success. In: International journal of social welfare, Jg. 22, H. 4, S. 406-419. DOI:10.1111/ijsw.12008

Abstract

"This article presents an assessment of welfare reforms under a framework of programme heterogeneity and alternative measures of success. The study focused on a specific programme - Madrid's Ingreso Madrileño de Integración (Madrid Regional Government's Welfare Programme) - which comprises heterogeneous sub-programmes. We tested whether work-related sub-programmes performed better than general activities aimed at improving life skills by analysing the effects on different types of outcomes. We also tried to identify which work-related sub-programme worked best. Our results show that intensive employment activities yield remarkably better results than general work-related schemes or life-skills activities. However, increasing work participation does not automatically lift participants out of material hardship." (Author's abstract, IAB-Doku) ((en))

Abstract

"This report provides an initial evaluation of the comprehensive reform of the Spanish labour market undertaken in 2012. The report was commissioned to the OECD by the Spanish government and it complements the evaluation of the 2012 labour market reform undertaken by the Labour Ministry (Ministerio de Empleo y Seguridad Social (MEySS)) and presented in September 2013.
The evaluation presented in this report should be considered preliminary and mainly confined to the short-time impact of the reform, given the fact that only a short amount of time has passed since the reform was undertaken and the complexity of assessing the impact of such a comprehensive reform.
The objective of this report is to describe the key components of the 2012 reform and place them in the context of the evolution of labour market institutions in other OECD member countries, with a particular focus on collective bargaining and employment protection legislation. The report also assesses the impact of the reform on the ability of firms to adjust wages and working time to cope with demand shocks (so-called internal flexibility), as well as the flows in the labour market for different types of contracts and the overall duality of the Spanish labour market. The report also considers what complementary reforms would be required to improve the effectiveness of the labour market reform, in particular in the area of active labour market policies." (Author's abstract, IAB-Doku) ((en))

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Malo, Miguel A. (2011): Labour market policies in Spain under the current recession. (International Institute for Labour Studies. Discussion paper 210), Geneva, 98 S.

Abstract

"First of all, we analyze employment protection legislation, in order to understand the main determinants of dismissals costs and the gap in separation costs respect to workers with temporary contracts. This analysis will allows discussing the labour market reform implemented in 2010 in order to fight against the dual structure of the Spanish labour market (commonly used as the main explanation of the fast process of job destruction in the current crisis). We will focus not only on the regulation of dismissal costs, but mainly on the practice, in other words, on how employers and workers use legal regulation. Second, we will review passive and active policies. The different interventions implemented as an answer to the crisis are described. Although the time period is rather small, we provide some quantitative evidence on the new measures. The analysis focuses on participants, the coverage of policies and expenditures. Two active policies are analyzed in separate sections because of their relevance: public employment services and programmes for young people. A final section provides a general discussion about the challenges of the current crisis on labour market policies in Spain, mainly attending to the heavy limitations imposed by Fiscal Consolidation Plans. An appendix with a brief description of the main components of the labour markets reforms from the eighties of the last century to 2010-2011 closes this study." (Text excerpt, IAB-Doku) ((en))

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Card, David, Jochen Kluve & Andrea Weber (2010): Active labor market policy evaluations. A meta-analysis. (NBER working paper 16173), Cambridge, Mass., 48 S. DOI:10.3386/w16173

Abstract

"This paper presents a meta-analysis of recent microeconometric evaluations of active labor market policies. Our sample contains 199 separate 'program estimates' - estimates of the impact of a particular program on a specific subgroup of participants - drawn from 97 studies conducted between 1995 and 2007. For about one-half of the sample we have both a short-term program estimate (for a one-year post-program horizon) and a medium- or long-term estimate (for 2 or 3 year horizons). We categorize the estimated post-program impacts as significantly positive, insignificant, or significantly negative. By this criterion we find that job search assistance programs are more likely to yield positive impacts, whereas public sector employment programs are less likely. Classroom and on-the-job training programs yield relatively positive impacts in the medium term, although in the short-term these programs often have insignificant or negative impacts. We also find that the outcome variable used to measure program impact matters. In particular, studies based on registered unemployment are more likely to yield positive program impacts than those based on other outcomes (like employment or earnings). On the other hand, neither the publication status of a study nor the use of a randomized design is related to the sign or significance of the corresponding program estimate. Finally, we use a subset of studies that focus on post-program employment to compare meta-analytic models for the 'effect size' of a program estimate with models for the sign and significance of the estimated program effect. We find that the two approaches lead to very similar conclusions about the determinants of program impact." (Author's abstract, IAB-Doku) ((en))

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Kahn, Lawrence M. (2010): Labor market policy. A comparative view on the costs and benefits of labor market flexibility. (IZA discussion paper 5100), Bonn, 36 S.

Abstract

"I review theories and evidence on wage-setting institutions and labor market policies in an international comparative context. These include collective bargaining, minimum wages, employment protection laws, unemployment insurance (UI), mandated parental leave, and active labor market policies (ALMPs). Since it is unlikely that an unregulated private sector would provide the income insurance these institutions do, these policies may enhance economic efficiency. However, to the extent that unemployment or resource misallocation results from such measures, these efficiency gains may be offset. Overall, Scandinavia and Central Europe follow distinctively more interventionist policies than the English speaking countries in the Northern Hemisphere. Possible explanations for such differences include vulnerability to external market forces and ethnic homogeneity. I then review evidence on the impacts of these policies and institutions. While the interventionist model appears to cause lower levels of wage inequality and high levels of job security to incumbent workers, it also in some cases leads to the relegation of new entrants (disproportionately women, youth and immigrants) as well as the less skilled to temporary jobs or unemployment. Making labor markets more flexible could bring these groups into the regular labor market to a greater extent, at the expense of higher levels of economic insecurity for incumbents and higher levels of wage inequality. The Danish model of loosening employment protections while providing relatively generous UI benefits with strict job search requirements holds out the possibility of reducing barriers for new entrants and the less skilled while maintaining some level of income insurance." (Author's abstract, IAB-Doku) ((en))

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Kluve, Jochen (2010): The effectiveness of European active labor market programs. In: Labour economics, Jg. 17, H. 6, S. 904-918. DOI:10.1016/j.labeco.2010.02.004

Abstract

"Active Labor Market Programs are widely used in European countries, but despite many econometric evaluation studies analyzing particular programs no conclusive cross-country evidence exists regarding 'what program works for what target group under what (economic and institutional) circumstances?'. This paper aims at answering this question using a meta-analysis based on a data set that comprises 137 program evaluations from 19 countries. The empirical results of the meta-analysis are surprisingly clear-cut: Rather than contextual factors such as labor market institutions or the business cycle, it is almost exclusively the program type that seems to matter for program effectiveness. While direct employment programs in the public sector frequently appear detrimental, wage subsidies and 'Services and Sanctions' can be effective in increasing participants' employment probability. Training programs - the most commonly used type of active policy - show modestly positive effects." (Author's abstract, IAB-Doku) ((en))