females. The proportion of unemployed who mentioned active methods of job search (contacting employers, placing ads in the press or trying to create own business) stayed at approximately 20 percent during 1997-2000. Most of these unemployed individuals contacted employers directly. Only a small portion of the unemployed were trying to start their own business, less than 1 percent of all unemployed. Slightly more than 2 percent placed ads in the press.

In 2001-2002, the LFS permitted the unemployed to indicate more than one method of job search, and this revealed a different picture of how job search is undertaken. As shown in the lower panel of Figure 20, active methods were used by more than 40 percent of the unemployed in 2001 and almost 60 percent in 2002. The SES was used by 30 percent in 2001 and by 36 percent of individuals in 2002. This includes those who were sent to job training by the SES. Attempts to start up a business were still not popular among the unemployed, at 1.5 percent of all unemployed in 2001 and just 1.1 percent in 2002.

**Women are more likely to rely on the State Employment Service** .  The Latvian LFS shows strong differences between the sexes. Appendix Table 22 provides the results of logit models estimating the impact of various factors on search strategies of the unemployed in 2001-2002. Other things equal, women were significantly less likely than men to use active methods, and significantly more likely than men to the use SES in job search.  Gender differences in the predicted probabilities of using active methods of job search were 0.08 in 2002 and 0.11 for SES, somewhat higher than in the previous year. In contrast, ethnic differences in job search strategies were not apparent in 2002, whereas in 2001 minorities were more likely to use active methods and less likely to use SES than Latvians. Most likely, this and other differences between 2002 and 2001 have to do with the fact that 2002 questionnaire offered a more detailed description of  active methods of  job search, and so led to individuals characterizing their job search activities differently.

**The SES does not attract new labor market entrants, the well-educated, or the long-term unemployed.** Two target groups of state employment policy-the young unemployed and the long-term unemployed, appear to make relatively little use of its job finding services. Appendix Table 22 shows that young people are less likely to contact the SES in their job search than otherwise similar counterparts of prime age. Similarly, those who have been unemployed for one year or more are less likely to use the SES for job search than those with similar characteristics and shorter elapsed unemployment durations. For a jobseeker aged 20-24 without previous work experience, the probability of contacting the SES in 2002 was 0.30 (0.18 + 0.12) smaller than for the unemployed of prime age (after controlling for education, gender, ethnicity and region of residence).  In 2001 the effect was weaker but still significant. This clearly suggests that the SES has not become attractive for individuals who do not qualify for unemployment benefits. Given the fact that most of the vacancies reported by the SES do not require higher or even secondary education, it is not surprising that probability of using the SES among the unemployed with secondary education was 5 percent lower than for someone with basic education. In 2002 it was even lower for persons with higher education.

**District level unemployment.** Regional disparities in unemployment are a key concern to policy makers. Appendix Tables 22 and 23 present the results of models which shed light on regional differences in job search strategies. This permits an indirect means of assessing the performance of local branches of the SES across Latvia’s districts.

As far as high unemployment districts are concerned, it appears that jobseekers in Madonas, Balvu, Rezeknes, Daugavpils, Kraslavas, Liepajas and Rezeknes districts are relatively likely to use the SES. Liepajas, Rezeknes, and the Dobeles district are associated with a low probability of using active search methods. At the other end of the spectrum is Aizkraukles district, with a relatively high likelihood of active search and low probability of using the SES. Note that unemployment in Aizkraukle is above average but not as high as in most of the above-mentioned districts.

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