the long run effects of unemployment monitoring and work search programs experimental evidence from the united kingdom this article examines the long run effects of the restart unemployment program in the united kingdom the program aimed at the long term unemployed involved a combination of tighter monitoring of benefit eligibility rules and increased job search assistance we compare the employment behavior of a treatment group who participated in the scheme with that of a randomly chosen control group for whom participation was delayed while there is little evidence of a long term benefit for women the unemployment rate among males in the treatment group was six percentage points lower than that of the control group 5 years after the initial experiment

macroeconomics with endogenous markups and optimal taxation i augment a flexible price dynamic general equilibrium model with any symmetric intratemporal preferences over a variety of goods supplied under monopolistic bertrand or cournot competition to derive implications for business cycle and market inefficiencies endogenous markups can magnify the impact of shocks on consumption and labor supply through intertemporal substitution mechanisms and the optimal fiscal policy requires a variable labor income subsidy and a capital income tax that converges to zero in the long run with an endogenous number of goods and strategic interactions entry also affects markups and the optimal fiscal policy requires also a tax on profits i characterize equilibrium and efficient market structures and derive optimal tax rules for a variety of preferences including a new type of general additive preferences that nest direct indirect implicit and homothetic additivity

does a minimum job search requirement reduce time on unemployment payments evidence from the jobseeker diary in australia this study examines the impact of thejobseeker diary jsd a program designed to increase the job search effort of unemployed persons in australia the jsd program is distinguished by combining a focus on work search verification with large scale imple mentation applying a quasi experimental matching method to data on unemployment spells occurring in 1997 98 the authors find that jsd participation was associated with an increased rate of exit from unemployment payment recipiency and a shorter total time spent on payments payment receipt duration is estimated to have fallen for about one half of jsd participants the largest effects of the jsd occurred for payment recipients for whom labor demand conditions were the most favorable cost benefit analysis suggests a fairly large net societal gain per program participant this study examines a large scale interven tion intended to increase job search ef fort of unemployed persons in australia the intervention the jobseeker diary jsd is a work search verification program that re quires unemployment payment recipients to complete a fortnightly biweekly diary in which details of a specified minimum number of job applications must be recorded the scale of the jsd program and its focus on work search verification make it unique in the international context

lessons from the u s unemployment insurance experiments recent social experiments have evaluated two reforms of the unemployment insurance ui system reemployment bonuses and job search programs the bonus experiments show that economic incentives affect the length of ui receipt and provide weak evidence that an earlier return to work does not decrease earnings the experiments do not show the favorability of a permanent bonus program as they ignore its effect on the number of the claimants the job search experiments test several more promising reforms nearly all of the combinations of services and increased enforcement reduce ui receipt and have favorable cost benefit analyses earnings often increase though the estimates are imprecise

fiscal policy banks and the financial crisis this paper studies the effectiveness of euro area ea fiscal policy during the recent financial crisis using an estimated new keynesian model with a bank a key dimension of policy in the crisis was massive government support for banks that dimension has so far received little attention in the macroeconomics literature we use the estimated model to analyze the effects of bank asset losses of government support for banks and other fiscal stimulus measures in the ea our results suggest that support for banks had a stabilizing effect on ea output consumption and investment increased government purchases helped to stabilize output but crowded out consumption higher transfers to households had a positive impact on private consumption but a negligible effect on output and investment banking shocks and increased government spending explain half of the rise in the public debt gdp ratio since the onset of the crisis

endogenous market structures in the credit market and ricardian equivalence we analyze the impact of imperfect competition in banking on fiscal policy in a dynamic model in an exchange two period economy the impact of deficit spending is to reduce private consumption and increase the spread between deposit and lending rates the reason is that a tax cut forces consumers to save more and makes their supply of savings more rigid which softens competition between banks leading to lower rates on deposits and a more than proportional increase in savings in a closed production economy this reduces the equilibrium interest rate on borrowers which promotes private investment

measuring the effect of subsidized training programs on movements in and out of employment despite over two decades of u s experience in operating large scale subsidized training programs for low income and unemployed workers the effects of these programs are still highly controversial the controversy arises from the difficulty of specifying the model of participant outcomes in the absence of training that is necessary in any nonexperimental program evaluation in this paper we suggest that some of these difficulties may be overcome by focusing on a very simple measure of outcomes namely the probability of employment we present a variety of estimates of the effect of training on the probability of employment for the 1976 cohort of adult male participants in the comprehensive employment and training act ceta program our methods range from a simple comparison of pre and post training employment probabilities between trainees and nonparticipants to a fully specified first order markov model of employment probabilities with individual heterogeneity there is consistent evidence across methods that ceta participation increased the probability of employment in the three years after training by from 2 to 5 percentage points classroom training programs appear to have had significantly larger effects than on the job programs although the estimated effects of both kinds of programs are positive we also find that movements in and out of employment for trainees and nonparticipants are reasonably well described by a first order process conditional on individual heterogeneity in the context of this model ceta participation appears to have increased both the probability of moving into employment and the probability of continuing employment

is success hereditary evidence on the performance of spawned ventures a common phenomenon in entrepreneurship is that employees turn away from employment to found their own businesses prior literature discusses the former employers characteristics that influence the creation of entrepreneurial ventures an investigation of whether these characteristics also affect the success of the spawned ventures is missing so far this paper contributes to the literature by showing that entrepreneurial ventures spawned by well performing firms are financially more successful than ventures stemming from poorly performing firms this suggests that spawned entrepreneurs are able to exploit valuable knowledge from their previous employers which impacts their ventures performance positively the analysis is based on a linked employee employer data set for the netherlands for the period 1999 2004

job search requirements effort provision and labor market outcomes abstract how effective are effort targets this paper provides novel evidence on the effects of job search requirements on effort provision and labor market outcomes based on large scale register data we estimate the returns to required job search effort instrumenting individual requirements with caseworker stringency identification is ensured by the conditional random assignment of job seekers to caseworkers we find that the duration of un and non employment both decrease by 3 if the requirement increases by one monthly application when instrumenting actual applications with caseworker stringency an additionally provided monthly application decreases the length of spells by 4 in line with theory we further find that the effect of required effort decreases in the individual s voluntary effort finally the requirement level causes small negative effects on job stability reducing the duration of re employment spells by 0 3 per required application we find a zero effect on re employment wages

new keynesian phillips curve with bertrand competition and endogenous entry abstract we derive a new keynesian phillips curve under calvo staggered pricing and endogenous market structures with bertrand competition both strategic interactions and endogenous business creation strengthen the nominal rigidities price adjusters change their prices less when there are more direct competitors that do not adjust which reduces the slope of the phillips curve current and future firms entering in the markets decrease current inflation because they reduce markups and the welfare based price index endogenous entry amplifies the impact of both monetary and supply shocks we also characterize the optimal social planner allocation that can be replicated with a labor subsidy and a dividend tax both decreasing in the number of firms and zero producer price inflation the optimal ramsey allocation implies zero inflation tax in steady state

an examination of the influence of industry structure on eight alternative measures of new venture performance for high potential independent new ventures abstract this study examined the influence of the structure of new ventures entered industries on eight alternative measures of new venture performance for 199 high potential independent new ventures each of the 199 entrepreneurial ventures had undertaken an initial public offering ipo within the first 6 years of the venture s founding date and were free of corporate sponsorship or prior corporate parentage specifically this research examined the influence of 1 stage of the life cycle 2 industry concentration 3 entry barriers and 4 product differentiation on eight alternative measures of new venture performance the eight measures of new venture performance examined in this research consisted of 1 change in sales 2 sales level 3 net profit 4 earnings before interest and taxes 5 return on sales 6 return on assets 7 return on invested capital and 8 return on equity most prior research examining the influence of industry structure on new venture performance has 1 utilized only one or two measures of new venture performance as indicators of the venture s overall effectiveness and efficiency 2 often failed to provide theoretical justification for the measure s of new venture performance or industry structure examined and 3 utilized data derived from questionnaires and or the pims data base of corporate sponsored new ventures in addition prior industry structure studies examining independent new ventures have often utilized relatively small sample sizes this study sought to advance the progress in the field of entrepreneurship with regard to understanding the influence of the structure of new ventures entered industries on new venture performance by 1 examining eight alternative measures of new venture performance 2 providing theoretical justification for the measures of new venture performance and industry structure examined and 3 utilizing the largest nonquestionnaire data base of independent new ventures developed to date this research found that the stage of the life cycle of the venture s entered industry was the most important determinant of new venture performance among the four industry structural elements examined stage of the life cycle had a statistically significant relationship at a 0 05 level with the majority of the new venture performance measures examined in this research in addition ventures entering industries in the introductory stage of the life cycle achieved the highest levels of venture performance particularly when compared with those ventures that entered industries in the mature stage of the life cycle however this study did not find a statistically significant relationship between stage of the life cycle and change in sales this suggests that there is a trade off between profitability and sales growth and that new ventures that undertake an ipo have a stronger focus on achieving profitable operations rather than sales growth during the initial years after their ipo this may be due to pressures placed on the new ventures to achieve profitability by the external credit market conversely this research found that 1 industry concentration 2 entry barriers and 3 product differentiation did not have statistically significant relationships at a 0 10 level with any of the eight alternative measures of new venture performance examined in this research however this research did find that over 90 of the new ventures entered industries characterized by 1 a low degree of industry concentration and 2 a high degree of product differentiation the relative absence of new venture entry into industries characterized by 1 high degrees of concentration and 2 low degrees of product differentiation provides support for prior theory which suggests that successful entry into such industry environments may be substantially more difficult in sum the results of this research suggest that high potential independent new ventures that undertake an ipo should enter industries in the introductory stage of the life cycle in addition the results of this research suggest that industries characterized by 1 relatively low degrees of industry concentration and 2 highly heterogenous products may be necessary but not sufficient conditions for successful entry by high potential independent new ventures seeking to raise equity capital through an ipo

endogenous market structures and optimal taxation this article provides optimal labour and dividend income taxation in a general equilibrium model with oligopolistic competition and endogenous firms entry in the long run the optimal dividend income tax corrects for inefficient entry the dividend income tax depends on the form of competition and the nature of the sunk entry costs in particular it is higher in market structures characterised by competition in quantities rather than those characterised by price competition oligopolistic competition leads to an endogenous countercyclical price markup as a result offsetting the distortions over the business cycle requires deviations from full tax smoothing

making the most out of programme evaluations and social experiments accounting for heterogeneity in programme impacts the conventional approach to social programme evaluation focuses on estimating mean impacts of programmes yet many interesting questions regarding the political economy of programmes the distribution of programme benefits and the option values conferred on programme participants require knowledge of the distribution of impacts or features of it this paper presents evidence that heterogeneity in response to programmes is empirically important and that classical probability inequalities are not very informative in producing estimates or bounds on the distribution of programme impacts we explore two methods for supplementing the information in these inequalities based on assumptions about participant decision making processes and about the strength in dependence between outcomes in the participation and non participation states dependence is produced as a consequence of rational choice by participants we test for stochastic rationality among programme participants and present and implement methods for estimating the option values of social programmes

estimating the effect of counseling and monitoring the unemployed using a job search model this paper examines the impact of the counseling and monitoring program for the unemployed with particular reference to their job finding rate application intensity and matching probability the effectiveness of counseling and monitoring is measured by using a job search model in which the job finding rate is equal to the product of the application intensity and the matching probability counseling and monitoring is an intensive job search assistance program designed to help unemployed people receiving unemployment benefits to find a job as quickly as possible the empirical analysis is based on data from a social experiment a sample of the inflow into unemployment was randomly assigned to a treatment and a control group the empirical results based on formal reduced form models show that counseling and monitoring does reduce the time taken to find a job because people participating in the program make more applications than those who are not participating although no differences are found in matching probabilities

endogenous market structures and the business cycle we propose a flexible prices model where endogenous market structures and search and matching frictions in the labor market interact endogenously the interplay between firms endogenous entry strategic interactions among producers and labor market frictions represents a strong amplification channel of technology shocks on labor market variables and helps addressing the unemployment volatility puzzle consistently with u s evidence new firms create a large fraction of new jobs and grow faster than more mature firms net firms entry is procyclical and the price mark up is countercyclical

an evaluation of the swedish system of active labour market programmes in the 1990s we investigate the presence of short and long term effects from joining a swedish labor market program vis a vis more intense job search in open unemployment overall the impact of the program system is found to have been mixed joining a program has increased employment rates among participants a result robust to a misclassification problem in the data on the other hand it has also allowed participants to remain significantly longer on unemployment benefits and more generally in the unemployment system this being particularly the case for those entitled individuals entering a program around the time of their unemployment benefits exhaustion

regional transformation through technological entrepreneurship abstract what does it take for a region to foster technological entrepreneurship recently there has been significant interest in this topic most writers on this topic emphasize the tangible infrastructure such as sound legal systems transparent capital markets advanced telecommunications and transportation systems etc sound legal systems capital markets and other structural features are necessary prerequisites for technopreneurship however what i am calling the intangibles of entrepreneurship are the sufficient conditions that allow specifically for schumpeterian entrepreneurship to thrive in a locality often governments attempt to promote technopreneurship by injecting risk capital they distribute these funds through small business development centers and several regions and countries have even attempted public venture capital funds however my hypothesis is that if only risk capital is injected it flows straight to low quality entrepreneurship focusing on only risk capital the investing government assumes that the risk capital itself will create all other prerequisites for growth this is a major supposition if risk capital is expected to produce extraordinary wealth it must be accompanied by seven other intangibles including access to novel ideas role models informal forums region specific opportunities safety nets access to large markets and executive leadership

the spatial evolution of the british automobile industry does location matter this article aims to describe and explain the spatial evolution of the automobile sector in great britain from an evolutionary perspective this analysis is based on a unique database of all entries and exits in this sector during the period 1895 1968 collected by the authors cox regressions show that spinoff dynamics agglomeration economies and time of entry have had a significant effect on the survival rate of automobile firms during the period 1895 1968

unemployment duration and the restart effect some experimental evidence in this paper we analyse the effect of ihe restart programme in the united kingdom this programme consisis of an interview of tbe long term unemployed to counsel them on effective job search failure to attend the interview carries the threat of the cessation of unemployment benefits the results using experimental data indicate that the programme has a significant effect of reducing unemployment duration estimation of an independent competing risks model distinguishing between exits from unemployment to a job a training placement or to signing off unemployment benefit shows that the channels through which restart works differs according to exit type

effects of unemployment insurance work search requirements the maryland experiment this paper describes findings from a 1994 experimental evaluation of alternative work search requirements in the unemployment insurance ui program requiring additional employer contacts or verification of contacts reduced ui receipt by one week and 115 per claimant because these additional requirements did not entail additional re employment services the ui spell reduction can be attributed to increased non monetary costs for remaining on ui a job search workshop requirement reduced ui receipt by half a week and 75 per claimant and additional results indicate that the effects were due to increased costs of continued ui receipt rather than to enhanced job search productivity these treatments did not affect employment or earnings implying that reduced ui duration led to more intensive job search rather than a reduction in the reservation wage in contrast elimination of the employer contact requirement increased ui receipt and post ui earnings suggesting that delayed exit from ui improved job matches he unemployment insurance ui program is designed to provide temporary income support to involuntarily unemployed individuals while they search for work although the ui program provides only temporary income support for the involuntarily unemployed it can reduce the incentive to seek employment because ui benefits reduce the cost of being unemployed resulting in an increase in the reservation wage and longer spells of unemployment to partially offset the negative impact ui benefits have onjob search state ui programs typically impose work search requirements for continued benefit receipt

accounting for heterogeneity diversity and general equilibrium in evaluating social programmes this paper considers the merits and limitations of alternative criteria proposed to evaluate social programmes in the modern welfare state and the information required to implement them when individual responses to programmes are heterogeneous participation in programmes is based in part on this heterogeneity and the programmes have general equilibrium impacts on the economy particular attention is devoted to the voting criterion used in modern positive political economy and the ranking of alternative social states based on anonymity postulates evidence on heterogeneity is presented conflicts among the criteria are revealed in two empirical studies partial equilibrium approaches are shown to be misleading

active labour market policies a case of evidence based policy making the 1990s was a decade of renewed enthusiasm for active labour market policies however it is not clear that this was the result of an appreciation of the evidence on the effectiveness of different policies relatively simple and cost effective initiatives to improve matching and to enhance job search appear to have a significant impact on employment training programmes generally do not produce better outcomes there is no convincing evidence that work programmes improve employment and recruitment subsidies often suffer from low take up however a strategy appears to be emerging in the uk and the usa by design or by accident of trying to use job search focused programmes to move people into regular employment and then to subsidize households especially with children so that their net incomes can come above the poverty line most of this expenditure could be classified as good old fashioned fiscal redistribution to the poor copyright 2000 by oxford university press

evaluating the employment impact of a mandatory job search program this paper exploits area based piloting and age related eligibility rules to identify treatment effects of a labor market program the new deal for young people in the u k a central focus is on substitution displacement effects and on equilibrium wage effects the program includes extensive job assistance and wage subsidies to employers we find that the impact of the program significantly raised transitions to employment by about 5 percentage points the impact is robust to a wide variety of nonexperimental estimators however we present some evidence that this effect may not be as large in the longer run jel j18 j23 j38