TOPIC :- UNEMPLOYMENT IN THE COUNTRY
AUTHOR :- RASHI DINESH AGRAWAL
Heading 1:- Unemployment by Gender: Evidence from EU Countries.
Bakas Dimitrios and Papapetrou Evangelia (2014) states that , this article examines the validity of hysteresis in gender unemployment rates and the gender unemployment gap for 15 European countries using panel unit-root tests. They finds that there is evidence to reject the null hypothesis of hysteresis for the unemployment rates and unemployment gap series. However, when considering cross-sectional dependence and heterogeneous structural breaks, this result is reverted, and the null hypothesis of unit root is not rejected. The high and persistent unemployment rates across European countries and the U.S. have attracted significant theoretical and empirical work. Economists suggest that major macroeconomic disturbances, such as productivity slowdowns, oil price rises, and changes in world interest rates, could account for the rise and persistence of unemployment. Two main hypotheses on unemployment behavior are hysteresis and the natural rate of unemployment. The natural rate of unemployment hypothesis suggests that cyclical fluctuations have permanent effects on the level of unemployment due to labor market restrictions, while the hysteresis hypothesis suggests that shocks affecting the series have temporary effects.
The level stationarity of unemployment (rejection of the unit root hypothesis) supports the natural rate of unemployment hypothesis, while the presence of a unit root implies that shocks affecting the series have permanent effects, supporting the hysteresis hypothesis .The issue of unemployment persistence in the EU has been extensively studied, but the structure of unemployment by gender has received relatively little attention. Recent studies have identified dramatic differences across various demographic groups, especially between men and women. This research study according to them have highlighted the importance of analyzing the time series behavior of disaggregated unemployment rates and showing the differential effects of unanticipated shocks on unemployment rates of various demographic groups.
Queneau and Sen (2008) presented empirical evidence regarding unemployment dynamics for women and men in eight OECD countries using unit-root testing. They found that the degree of persistence of gender-based unemployment rates is rather low. However, most of these studies used univariate methods to explore the dynamics of unemployment rates for men and women. To address this problem, two different approaches are followed in the literature on testing the hysteresis hypothesis: the use of unit-root testing techniques that allow for the presence of structural breaks, and the application of panel unit root tests that allow for cross-sectional correlation in the error terms and help to avoid severe size distortions. This research contributes to the literature in two ways. First, it examines the nature of unemployment rates by gender for a panel of 15 European countries over the period 1977–2009 with the aim of gaining insights into the dynamics of unemployment by gender. To their knowledge, the issue of unemployment persistence by gender is addressed for the first time in a panel framework analysis. The study of unemployment hysteresis by gender in EU countries provides potential valuable insights and is of major importance from a policy point of view.
Second, the research addresses the issue of investigating the unemployment hysteresis hypothesis by gender for EU countries using panel unit root tests that allow for structural changes and also consider for cross-sectional dependence. This allows for more powerful results and addresses possible heterogeneity across EU countries that may occur due to the different economic and labor market conditions in EU countries.
Employing these panel unit root tests on the gender unemployment rates series, the research produces interesting results. When they do account for level and trend breaks but do not address cross-sectional dependence, the null hypothesis is rejected, indicating that the gender gap in unemployment rates has narrowed.
Heading 2:- GDP dynamics and unemployment changes in developed and developing countries.
BARTOLUCCI, F. et al. (2018) states that, the study by Bartolucci, Choudhry, Marelli, and Signorelli from the University of Perugia, Lahore, and the University of Brescia, Italy, focuses on the relationship between GDP dynamics and unemployment changes in developed and developing countries. They propose a new specification of Okun’s model that considers factors such as the relationship in first differences, the potential lagged effect of GDP dynamics on unemployment, the persistence of unemployment rate dynamics, the different values of Okun coefficients under recession, cross-country institutional and structural differences, and the additional impact of financial crises on unemployment. The model, which belongs to the linear mixed-effects family, uses an expectation-maximization (EM) algorithm for estimation. The results confirm the general validity of Okun’s law, show differences in Okun coefficients between high- and low-income countries, and indicate an additional impact of financial crises on the unemployment dynamics of developed economies. The study highlights the importance of considering the distinction between developed and developing countries and the additional impact of financial crises.
The economic literature has focused on the relationship between GDP dynamics and unemployment changes, particularly from a cyclical point of view. Okun (1962) defined a coefficient corresponding to the rate of change of real output associated with a given change in the unemployment rate. A large body of empirical research estimating the Okun coefficients has mostly assumed that causality operates in the reverse direction (i.e., changes in output explain variations in unemployment). Since there are hundreds of empirical studies on Okun’s law, this text focuses on those most relevant to our chosen specifications.
Kaufman (1988) was one of the first studies to conduct an international comparison (six countries) of Okun’s law, showing significant differences in the cyclical responses of unemployment rates. Prachowny (1993) considered the theoretical foundation of Okun’s law and derived empirical evidence for the US, supporting the view that the Okun’s equation is a useful proxy in macroeconomics. Linder (1997) included the relationship between unemployment and growth among the principles of macroeconomics in which “we should all believe,” despite some theoretical limitations. Lee (2000) estimated the Okun’s equation for all OECD countries and stressed that the relationship is not stable over time and differs across countries, but he concluded that the impact of growth on (un)employment is still valid. Many studies have emphasized not only the cross-country differences in Okun coefficients–mainly explained by institutional differences–but also their instability over time.
From a methodological point of view, Okun’s law can be estimated in different ways. One approach considers both the difference between unemployment and its ‘natural rate’ (dependent variable) and the difference between GDP and the ‘potential output’ (explanatory variable). In this version, the relation can be estimated in ‘levels’, but the awkward issue is computing reliable measures for the natural unemployment rate and for the potential output.
Another specification of Okun’s law used in many studies during the past half a century estimates a relation between the changes in the unemployment rate and the GDP growth rates (i.e. considering the first differences of the two key variables). Many other studies have investigated specific aspects related to Okun’s law, such as the role of institutions and policies in explaining changes in Okun coefficients across countries and over time.
Heading 3:- The Rise in Unemployment: A Multi-Country Study.
C. R. BEAN and P. R. G. LAYARD (1986) states that, the content is an article from the journal “ECONOMICA” that explores the factors that contribute to differences in unemployment rates across countries. The article discusses the impact of external shocks, government policies, tax and benefit systems, and labor market policies on labor market performance. It also examines the relationship between wages and labor market disequilibrium and the role of institutional and social characteristics in labor market behavior. The research utilizes a theoretical model to analyze labor demand and the impact of corporatism on labor market behavior. The author says that further research is needed to fully understand the complex factors that contribute to differences in labor market performance across countries. Overall, the article suggests that institutional characteristics are important in explaining differences in labor market behavior and that more corporatist economies do not necessarily fare better with respect to the rise in unemployment.
•According to research, Unemployment has risen significantly in most OECD countries since the 1970s, though the extent varies widely. Countries like Belgium, Canada, Italy, and the UK have unemployment rates over 10%, while Austria, Japan, Norway and Sweden have rates around 3%.
• Labor force growth does not fully explain the rise in unemployment. Though female participation has increased, overall labor force growth has not been markedly faster in recent years compared to the 1960s.
• Both demand and real wage factors affect unemployment levels. A decline in demand relative to potential output has been an important cause of rising unemployment, especially in Europe. However, supply-side factors like reduced search intensity and higher taxes have also contributed.
• The paper estimates wage and employment equations for each country. It finds that demand has a positive effect on employment in most countries, while wages generally have a negative impact. However, the U.S. shows a “perverse” response with wages having little effect on employment.
• Institutions and labor market structures vary across countries and influence their unemployment experiences. More “corporatist” economies with centralized bargaining and consensus tend to have more responsive wages, faster adjustment, and smaller responses of wages to tax and price shocks.
• While corporatist economies may have more efficient labor markets, this does not necessarily mean they have had less of a rise in unemployment. Macroeconomic policies and external shocks also influence unemployment performance.
Heading 4:- Real and perceived losses from unemployment: a cross-country study.
Bender, Keith A , Neumann et al. (2013) states that ,”Real and Perceived Losses from Unemployment: A Cross-Country Study “The Unemployment Rate (UR) is a measure of inefficiency used by the United Nations Economic Commission (OECD) to measure the relative inefficiency of countries. However, the UR overestimates the number of individuals who would find jobs if the market was clear. The Dead Weight Losses (DWLs) of UR are low even in high unemployment countries. The aggregate perceived monetary losses by the unemployed as a proportion of GDP are also uniformly low. Inframarginal individuals in some countries may perceive their losses to be high. High unemployment represents a waste of resources, and it is ironic and tragic that in search of ways to improve economic efficiency, the biggest inefficiency of all is ignored. The study highlights the need for more effective measures to measure inefficiency and the underutilization of labor.
They explore the issue of unemployment in economics, arguing that it is not directly translated into a given level of labour market inefficiency. The Unemployment Rate (UR) is often used as an indicator of unemployment, but this article questions this assumption and proposes three alternative measures to address these points.
The first measure is the Under-Full Employment Rate (UFER), which measures the number of unemployed workers who would gain employment if the market clears. The second measure is the Dead Weight Loss (DWL) associated with labour market inefficiencies, which differs substantially across countries. The third measure is the Perceived Loss (PL) faced by the unemployed, defined as the difference between the market wage and the reservation wage (as summarized by the labour supply curve) of the unemployed.
The article extends Benderet al. (2006)’s study of labour market inefficiencies over time for two countries to a broader set of countries, considering the institutional differences between labor markets. It also develops several new measures of the labour market inefficiency, going beyond replicating Benderet al. (2006) by estimating the true level of underutilization of labour as measured by the UFER.
The article also investigates the perceived loss in wages that unemployed individuals bear, which may be important from a public choice perspective. As the supply agents in the labour market constitute such a large proportion of voters, policy makers may be concerned about the perceived losses that unemployed workers may face. Comparing the measures to the UR, the authors show that the same level of unemployment can give rise to substantially different levels of UFERs, DWLs, and PLs, confirming the suspicion that URs are poor measures of (1) the underutilization of labour, (2) the labour market inefficiency, and (3) the perceived losses that the unemployed face.
The article concludes by comparing the various measures of the labour market inefficiency, detailing the data and empirical methodology, and discussing the impact on the ranking of countries in terms of the labour market inefficiency using these alternative measures of loss rather than the UR. These measures can provide important information to policy makers, which may help them to prescribe better policies.
Heading 5:- Cross‐Country Differences in Unemployment: Fiscal Policy, Unions, and Household Preferences in General Equilibrium.
Brecht Boone and Frederik Heylen (2019) states that, cross-country differences in unemployment, fiscal policy, union preferences, and wage setting in the general equilibrium of the labour market. The authors develop a five-period overlapping generations model with individuals who differ by ability and an imperfect labour market (union wage setting) for individuals of lower ability. The model explains human capital formation, hours worked, and unemployment within one coherent framework, matching the differences in the unemployment rate across 12 OECD countries remarkably well. A Shapley decomposition of these differences reveals an almost equal role for fiscal policy variables and union preferences. As to fiscal policy, differences in unemployment benefits play a much more important role than tax differences. Differences in households’ taste for leisure are unimportant.
Labour market performance differs widely across OECD countries, and many researchers have built gradually richer general equilibrium models to account for these differences. Initial contributions by Prescott (2004), Rogerson (2007), Dhont and Heylen (2008), and Ohanian et al. (2008) tried to explain differences in aggregate per capita hours worked. Later work introduced a life-cycle dimension in labor supply and employment to explain the huge cross-country differences in employment among people older than 50. Another advantage of introducing a life-cycle dimension is that it became possible to model the time allocation of young people between labour and education, and to explain human capital formation as an endogenous variable.
However, despite the enormous progress made in this literature, one clear weakness has not been dealt with: the assumption of a perfectly competitive labour market. The models cannot explain equilibrium unemployment, let alone the huge and persistent differences in unemployment between, for example, high- and lower-educated individuals. Yet, as demonstrated in Figure 1 for 12 OECD countries in the period 2001–2007, cross-country differences in aggregate employment are strongly related to differences in unemployment, in particular unemployment among lower-educated individuals.
The authors conclude that if it is the objective of countries to raise aggregate employment, an important challenge will be to fight unemployment among lower-educated individuals. The existing (dynamic) general equilibrium models for labour market analysis in the tradition of 2001–2007 are focused on this period, as this was the last period of relative stability in the labour market before the financial crisis and the euro crisis.
The general equilibrium literature on employment with labour market imperfections often fails to account for differences in individual preferences across countries. This paper aims to extend this literature and use a five-period overlapping generations (OLG) model to quantitatively explore the variables driving cross-country differences in unemployment, particularly among lower-educated individuals. The model assumes that individuals are heterogeneous by ability, with different human capital stocks and capacities to build more human capital. This approach aligns with findings that heterogeneity in human capital endowment at a young age and learning abilities account for most of the variation in lifetime utility.
A key novelty in this work is the assumption of a unionized labour market for lower-ability individuals. The authors introduce a monopolistic firm-specific trade union that determines the real pre-tax wage for these workers, taking aggregate variables and fiscal policy parameters as given. They specify a Stone-Geary utility function for the union with both wages and employment as arguments, albeit with a different weight. The firm-specific union chooses the wage in a first stage, while the firm chooses employment (number of workers), while the households of lower-ability individuals decide the number of workers.
Heading 6:- The short- and long-run impacts of financial crises on youth unemployment in OECD countries.
BRUNO, G. S. F. et al. (2017) states that, the study examines the impact of financial crises on youth unemployment rates (YUR) in OECD countries from 1981 to 2009 using bias-corrected dynamic panel data estimators. Both YUR and UR are found to be highly persistent, with short- and long-run effects of financial crises on YUR being significantly larger than the short- and long-run effects on UR. Similar results were found for the unemployment impacts of GDP growth lagged 1 year and institutional variables. The study is robust to various dynamic specifications and highlights the profound effects of the recent economic crisis on labor markets and the abrupt halt in the gradual decline in global unemployment rates. The recent increase in URs has been larger in some areas, especially in the ‘periphery’ of the Eurozone, but has affected almost all OECD countries, although with different degrees of persistence. The results are robust to various dynamic specifications and highlight the need for further research on the long-term effects of financial crises on youth unemployment.
The general trend of youth unemployment rates (YURs) has been observed in the US, Germany, Italy, Spain, and Greece, with only two exceptions. The US has seen a return to pre-crisis levels after the Great Recession (2009), while Germany has seen a continuous decrease in unemployment. In other countries, such as Italy, Spain, and Greece, URs have continued to rise, with a small decline in the past two years indicating they will remain higher than pre-crisis levels for a long period. This labor market situation has generated social and political problems, and it will pose a challenge to policymakers for years to come. The younger generation has been particularly affected, as youth unemployment rates (YURs) were at least twice as high as total URs before the crisis. Since the crisis, the increase in YURs has been larger than the rise in total rates, with young workers bearing the brunt of the ‘Great Recession’. Persistent unemployment is likely to become structural, especially in countries affected by the Eurozone recession (2012-13), raising the risk of becoming a ‘lost generation’.
This article investigates the impact of past financial crises on the long-term growth of the Gross Domestic Product (YURs) in 27 OECD countries. Many studies have investigated why YURs are persistently higher than adult URs. However, none of the existing analyses using panel data on countries have explicitly quantified the long-run effects of macroeconomic shocks and financial crises on YURs. This is a non-trivial issue in the case of panels with a small number of cross-sectional units, as well-known inconsistency and finite-sample biases affect Least Squares and Generalized Method of Moments (GMM) panel data estimators. The article provides estimates of the short- and long-run effects of financial crisis on YURs and total URs for a panel of (at most) 27 OECD countries over a period beginning in 1981 and ending in 2009, the year following the worst recession but when URs were still high or even rising.
The long-run increase of unemployment rates (URs and YURs) in many countries has been evident since the 1980s and 1990s, with a reduction in most years of the first decade of the 2000s. The jump in URs and YURs during financial crisis periods is also clear-cut. The article uses dynamic panel data estimators to deal with finite-sample biases in short- and long-run coefficients. YURs are at least twice as high as total URs in most countries, but in some countries, the ratio is even greater and has significantly increased in recent years. The recent financial crisis, which began in 2007-08, led to the Great Recession (2008-09), the most severe recession since the Great Depression of the 1930s. The impact of financial crises on the labour market is even more so, with unemployment rising sooner in the most flexible labour markets and later in countries with rigidities or internal flexibility. The situation is even more problematic in Europe.
The sovereign debt crisis in 2012-13 led to a new recession, affecting weaker market segments like young people. The Eurozone’s excessive austerity measures caused a slow recovery and stagnation. Studies estimate the effects of the last financial crisis and the Global Recession on unemployment, with studies including the World Bank, ILO, and O’Higgins estimating youth unemployment. However, the impact on labour markets remains significant.
Heading 7:- Still feeling employable with growing age? Exploring the moderating effects of developmental HR practices and country-level unemployment rates in the age – employability relationship.
DELLO RUSSO, S. et al. (2020) states that, the research investigates the relationship between age and perceived external employability, using age norms, stereotyping, and age meta-stereotypes. It aims to determine whether age is negatively related to perceived external employability and if the age-employability link is moderated by HR developmental practices (HRDPs) and country-level unemployment rates. The researchers argue that older workers perceive themselves as less externally employable due to being aware of stereotypes and age norms in organizations and holding meta-stereotypes about their group. However, the context, including HRDPs experienced during one’s working life, and the country unemployment rate, act as buffers.
Using data from a large-scale survey from over 9000 individuals in 30 institutionally diverse countries, the study found that the negative relationship between age and perceived external employability was significant across all countries. At the individual level, HRDPs acted as a buffer for this negative relationship, making the effect less pronounced for individuals who have experienced more HRDPs during their working life.
At the country level, the hypothesized moderating effect of unemployment rate was not observed. The study highlights the importance of understanding the relationship between age and perceived external employability, as it is crucial for securing one’s position in the labor market. However, there has been little research to explore this relationship directly.
In conclusion, the study highlights the need for organizations and societies to ensure external employability of the workforce across workers’ entire work-life span. By understanding the moderating effects of HR practices and country-level unemployment rates, organizations can better support their workforce and improve their overall employability.
Employability is a complex concept that encompasses both internal and external aspects of an individual’s job prospects. This paper focuses on the opportunity to continue working, which has been identified as a core aspect of employability. The study aims to investigate the role of both work-related and societal contexts in the relationship between age and perceived external employability.
Previous research has shown a negative relationship between age and self-perceived employability, but scholars argue that examining this relationship alone is too simplistic and provides little guidance on how older workers might remain employable. Contextual elements such as an employee’s activities and macro-level context have also been overlooked.
According to the author the work-related factor of Human Resource Developmental Practices (HRDPs) as a moderator, motivated by the major role organizations play in supporting individuals’ employment. It also examines the role of macro-level unemployment rate, a key characteristic of labor markets. By considering these boundary conditions, the study accounts for the inherently contextual nature of employability and the extent to which organizational practices and the labor market are influential for one’s employability self-perceptions.
The paper makes two critical contributions: first, it considers the role of organizational initiatives in shaping how individuals construct their perceptions of external employability as they age. Second, it examines whether the proposed negative relationship between age and perceived external employability is universal across country contexts. The study leverages a large cross-country dataset, moving employability research away from single-country or few-country studies and contributing to the scarce body of multi-level research on employability.
Perceived external employability and age are influenced by various factors, including organizational initiatives, macro-level unemployment rates, and the role of HRDPs in shaping individuals’ perceptions of external employability.
Heading 8:- The unemployment effect of hiring and firing regulation in developing countries: survey evidence.
Horst Feldmann (2013) states that, this article examines the unemployment effect of hiring and firing regulation in developing countries using surveys of senior company managers. The study finds that stricter regulation moderately increased unemployment in these countries from 1992 to 2008. The net effect on unemployment is ambiguous, and the direction and magnitude of this effect need to be resolved empirically. Most empirical studies have focused on industrial countries, with few on developing countries.
The lack of robust evidence for a significant effect of hiring and firing regulation on unemployment may be partly due to the use of objective indicators of hiring and firing regulation. These indicators have substantial limitations, as they cannot accurately capture the de facto strictness of hiring and firing regulations, which depends on the enforcement of formal rules and informal norms. This is particularly important in developing countries where laws, administrative orders, and court rulings are often not strictly enforced and informal norms play a more important role than in industrial countries.
Another limitation of objective indicators is that they cannot capture how employers judge the strictness of a given set of rules. This article uses surveys of senior business executives to capture these features and shed new light on the unemployment effect of hiring and firing regulation. It is the first study on developing countries to use such an indicator and covers a large number of developing countries.
The study focuses on the hiring and firing regulation variable, which is based on the World Economic Forum’s annual Executive Opinion Survey (EOS). It involves interviews with approximately 60-70 senior company managers in each country to determine whether hiring and firing of workers is either impeded by regulations or flexiblely determined by employers. The results are scaled to take values between zero and one, with higher values indicating stricter regulation.
The respondents from the EOS are likely to reflect the strictness of hiring and firing regulations correctly because they have comprehensive knowledge of and practical experience with these regulations, are likely to take all relevant aspects into account, and are the ones who decide on the recruitment and dismissal of workers. For comparison, an objective indicator, labelled ’employment protection legislation’, is used.
The study also controls for the impact of other major labour market institutions, such as collective bargaining, minimum wage, unemployment benefits, income and payroll taxes, and other factors that have been found to determine unemployment in developing countries. The sample covers 44 developing countries and annual data for 1992 to 2008. The sample size is determined by data availability only.
The model estimates the unemployment rate of countryiat yeart, Z denotes ‘hiring and firing regulation’ in main regressions and ’employment protection legislation’ in supplementary regressions. The sample size is determined by data availability only. The results show that higher values indicate a higher degree of centralization in collective bargaining, higher top marginal income and payroll tax rates, and stricter regulation, respectively.
The study uses various robustness checks to determine the relationship between hiring and firing regulation and unemployment. The results show that the hiring and firing regulation variable has a significant effect on the hiring and firing of workers, with higher values indicating stricter regulation. The study also considers other factors that may influence unemployment in developing countries, such as openness, output gap, GDP per capita, wars, real interest rate and inflation rate, private credit and stock market activity, systemic banking crises, product market and financial sector regulation, and regulation of international trade and capital account transactions.
Heading 9:- Unemployment, global economic crises and suicides: evidence from 21 OECD countries.
Huikari Sanna and Korhonen Marko (2021) states that, the relationship between unemployment, global economic crises, and suicide mortality in 21 OECD countries from 1960 to 2011. The findings indicate that higher unemployment rates lead to an increase in suicides in almost all age groups. Economic/financial crisis events show that these crises generally increase suicide rates. However, economic crises have no effect on those in the 45 to 64-year age group in terms of suicide. The study also assessed whether suicide mortality can be attributed to a ‘crisis effect’ beyond that of unemployment. For males, a significant joint effect between crises and unemployment was found. Additionally, the possible nonlinear threshold response of suicides to unemployment. It was found that suicides among young males (<45 years) are due to marked increases in unemployment in association with global economic crises.
Several studies have shown the negative consequences of unemployment in terms of suicides, such as Nordt et al. (2015) showing that one out of five suicides is related to unemployment. Blakely, Collings, and Atkinson (2003) report that being unemployed is associated with a two-to-threefold increase in the relative risk of suicide compared with being employed. In Spain, suicide was the first cause of death for those between the ages 15 and 44, in 2013.
The impact of economic crises on suicides has also been addressed in many studies, with over 10,000 suicides across Europe and North America between 2008 and 2010 being due to the Great Recession. However, there is little known about the effects of unemployment on suicides during economic crises. Some studies argue that unemployment has a direct causal influence on suicidal behavior and that this is independent of the overall economic environment .This study provides new evidence on the relationship between unemployment and suicides during economic crises, revealing whether unemployment per se caused excess suicides during the period or whether suicides increased in conjunction with the economic crises that occurred across developed countries from 1960 to 2011. The panel estimation framework allows for the examination of not only the separate effects of unemployment and economic crises on suicides but also their joint effects on this phenomenon .The investigation explores the relationship between unemployment, economic crises, and suicides. It finds that unemployment rates increase the incidence of male suicides across all age groups in OECD countries, particularly for young males aged 15-24 years. Economic crises have significantly more significant effects on suicides, with no significant relationship found between economic crises and suicides among middle-aged adults .The study also investigates whether unemployment affects suicides similarly during economic crises compared to periods without crises. However, no joint effect of economic crises and unemployment was found when measuring the ‘crisis effect’ using the global aggregate crisis index for females under 65 years of age and males aged 45-64 years. The results suggest that the national unemployment rate is a distinct economic hardship factor that affects suicides for these groups. For males under 45 years old, there is a strong association of unemployment and a global economic crisis as explaining suicides.
The data also provides a novel contribution by exploring the possible nonlinear response of suicide rates to unemployment. The results suggest that, especially for young males under 45 years old, the unemployment effect on suicides markedly increases when the global economic crisis level is high. However, when excluding older age groups, there were no similar effects for other age groups. In conclusion, unemployment, economic crises, and suicides are interconnected issues that can have significant impacts on individuals’ lives.
Heading 10 :- Unemployment rises in 2020, as the country battles the COVID-19 pandemic.
Smith Sean M, Edwards Roxanna et al. (2021) states that, the COVID-19 pandemic has significantly impacted the US labor market, with total civilian employment falling by 8.8 million over the year. The unemployment rate increased to 13.0% in the second quarter of the year before easing to 6.7% in the fourth quarter. This was due to the sudden halt in economic expansion and the record number of temporary layoffs caused by the pandemic.
The economic expansion continued for the first two months of 2020, reaching 128 months or 42 quarters. This was the longest economic expansion on record before millions of jobs were lost due to the pandemic. Total civilian employment, as measured by the Current Population Survey (CPS), fell by 21.0 million from the fourth quarter of 2019 to the second quarter of 2020, while the unemployment rate more than tripled, from 3.6% to 13.0 percent. This was the highest quarterly average unemployment rate in the history of the CPS.
The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) produces two monthly employment series obtained from two different surveys: the estimate of total nonfarm jobs, derived from the Current Employment Statistics (CES) survey, and the estimate of total civilian employment, derived from the Current Population Survey (CPS), also called the household survey. The two surveys use different definitions of employment, as well as different survey and estimation methods. The CES survey is a survey of employers that provides a measure of the number of payroll jobs in nonfarm industries, while the CPS is a survey of households that provides a measure of employed people ages 16 years and older in the civililian noninstitutional population.
However, late in the second quarter, the labor market began a slow recovery that continued for the rest of the year. The unemployment rate fell to 8.8% in the third quarter and to 6.7% in the fourth quarter. This was still 3.1 percentage points higher than a year earlier and reflected the 10.8 million people who were unemployed in the fourth quarter of 2020, which was 4.9 million more than at the end of 2019.
Total employment, as measured by the CPS, rose by 8.6 million in the third quarter of 2020 and by 3.6 million in the fourth quarter. At the end of the year, total employment averaged 149.8 million, 8.8 million (or 5.5%) less than in the fourth quarter of 2019. The employment-population ratio (the percentage of the population aged 16 and older who are employed) averaged 57.4% in the fourth quarter, down by 3.6 percentage points over the year.
This article highlights important developments in key labor market measures from the CPS during 2020, both overall and for various demographic groups. New questions added to the CPS beginning in May 2020 provide data on the number of people who teleworked, were unable to work, or were unable to look for work because of the pandemic. The article also examines usual weekly earnings and labor force status flows in 2020, as well as the employment situations of veterans, people with a disability, and the foreign born.
CONCLUSION:-
This is a research article that examines the relationship between age and perceived external employability. The study highlights the need for organizations and societies to ensure external employability of the workforce across workers’ entire work-life span. The paper makes two critical contributions: first, it considers the role of organizational initiatives in shaping how individuals construct their perceptions of external employability as they age. Second, it examines whether the proposed negative relationship between age and perceived external employability is universal across country contexts. The study leverages a large cross-country dataset, moving employability research away from single-country or few-country studies and contributing to the scarce body of multi-level research on employability.
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