A widely cited argument in favour of easing employment protection rules is that greater flexibility in hiring and firing can lead to increased job matching efficiency and productivity, but this may come at a cost for certain groups of workers. This column examines the impact of the 2012 ‘Fornero Reform’ in Italy, which lowered the legal and financial risks associated with dismissals for employers in order to encourage firms to offer more open-ended contracts and thus help bridge the divide between permanent and temporary employment. In practice, the reform increased the cost of job loss, particularly for younger and more vulnerable workers.
Italy's Radical Solution to Extreme Inequality
Why I'm Worried About Job Loss + Thoughts on Comparative Advantage — LessWrong
David Oks published a well-written essay yesterday arguing that the current panic about AI job displacement is overblown. I agree with a few of his p…
Do Employers Have More Monopsony Power in Slack Labor Markets?
This article confronts monopsony theory’s predictions regarding workers’ wages with observed wage patterns over the business cycle. Using German administrative data for the years 1985 to 2010 and an estimation framework based on duration models, the authors construct a time series of the labor supply elasticity to the firm and estimate its relationship to the unemployment rate. They find that firms possess more monopsony power during economic downturns. Half of this cyclicality stems from workers’ job separations being less wage driven when unemployment rises, and the other half mirrors that firms find it relatively easier to poach workers. Results show that the cyclicality is more pronounced in tight labor markets with low unemployment, and that the findings are robust to controlling for time-invariant unobserved worker or plant heterogeneity. The authors further document that cyclical changes in workers’ entry wages are of similar magnitude as those predicted under pure monopsonistic wage setting.
Are new technologies fuelling wage inequality? Evidence from Spain
New research shows the net effect of technological change (incl. artificial intelligence) on wages in Spain has been to fuel rising wage inequalities
Handbook of Labor Economics
What new tools and models are enriching labor economics?Developments in Research Methods and their Application, Volume 4A summarizes recent advances in the ways economists study wages, employment, and labor markets. Mixing conceptual models and empirical work, contributors cover subjects as diverse as field and laboratory experiments, program evaluation, and behavioral models. The combinations of these improved empirical findings with new models reveal how labor economists are developing new and innovative ways to measure key parameters and test important hypotheses. - Investigates recent advances in methods and models used in labor economics - Demonstrates what these new tools and techniques can accomplish - Documents how conceptual models and empirical work explain important practical issues
a simple (local) solution to the pay gap — wingolog
wingolog: article: a simple (local) solution to the pay gap
Wage Theft Costs American Workers as Much as $50 Billion a Year
Wage theft is a nationwide epidemic that costs American workers as much as $50 billion a year, a new Economic Policy Institute report finds. In An Epidemic of Wage Theft Is Costing Workers Hundreds of Millions of Dollars a Year, EPI Vice President Ross Eisenbrey and EPI intern Brady Meixell examine incidences of wage theft—employers’…
Days not worked due to strikes and lockouts, 2023
In the publication Quality of Employment in Canada, the days not worked due to strikes and lockouts indicator measures annual changes in the number of person-days and hours not worked due to labour disputes. The article examines data compiled by Employment and Social Development Canada and the Labour Force Survey to better understand trends in hours lost due to labour disputes.
Layoff University, Vol. 2: Progress Made, Lessons Learned - excellent notes
Reflections from my first month of unemployment
The Hidden Tax on Blue-Collar Workers and Building in America
The unemployment insurance system has a design flaw that penalizes the construction industry, leading to fewer workers and lower productivity. Over time, that means less – and more expensive – housing.
Work less, get more: New Zealand firm's four-day week an 'unmitigated success'
Reduced hours for same pay increased successful work-life balance management, cutting stress levels and boosting commitment
AI layoffs are looking more and more like corporate fiction that's masking a darker reality, Oxford Economics suggests | Fortune
"Firms don't appear to be replacing workers with AI on a significant scale," the firm said. It suspects some are trying to "dress up layoffs" as good news.
Job search and unemployment insurance
Do expanded unemployment benefits lower job-finding rates?
Young Graduates Face the Grimmest Job Market in Years
Artificial intelligence could reshape work, but for now a low-hire, low-fire labor market is the main impediment for young people seeking employment.
The AI Layoff Trap
If AI displaces human workers faster than the economy can reabsorb them, it risks eroding the very consumer demand firms depend on. We show that knowing this is not enough for firms to stop it. In...
