J21 - Labor Force and Employment, Size, and StructureReturn

Africa is endowed with both natural resources and a young growing workforce. In light of this, it is obvious that regulations on labour markets will have significant impacts on economic growth, especially through effects on employment and productivity. This study provides information on labour market regulations (labour market flexibility) and their impacts on economic growth in Africa. In particular, this study examines the impact of labour market flexibility (regulations) on economic growth (real GDP per capita growth) relying on the Driscoll-Kraay fixed-effects estimator and the two-step system generalized method of moments (GMM) estimation techniques using data from 2000 to 2019 for 37 African countries. The results show a positive correlation, indicating that liberalizing rigid labour market regulations can lead to economic growth benefits. Specifically, it is observed that economic growth increases by approximately 0.16% resulting from a unit (one standard deviation) increase in labour market flexibility. The study also finds that economic growth (real GDP per capita growth) is high in countries that have flexible hour regulations, flexible mandatory costs of worker dismissal, and the absence of (or not strictly enforced) military conscription. These findings have important implications for African governments and policymakers as they may find it useful to liberalize the prevailing rigid labour market regulations to reap economic growth benefits.

The tax wedge mainly quantifies the extent to which tax on labour income enervates employment and it reflects the total labour costs. It is commonly defined as the ratio between the amount of taxes paid by the worker and the related total labour costs for the employer. As such, the tax wedge affects both the labour force (unemployment) by reflecting the burden of the employer and indirectly the household disposable income. It is conferred that the alteration caused by the tax wedge on income distribution has been analysed with a small number of empirical studies. Based on the hypothesis that the tax wedge may affect income distribution from different aspects in terms of household size and income level, dynamic panel data analysis is carried out for 36 OECD member countries and the period 2000-2019. The dynamic panel analysis estimation findings for two households (single person with no children, earning 167% of the average wage, and one-earner married couple with two children, earning 100% of average wages) reveal that the tax wedge is negatively related to unfair income distribution. In addition, the aspect of the relationship is the same (negative) for the two households.

This study purpose is a questionnaire development used to quantify survey interviewer cha- racteristics. Five dimensions of personality were used: conscientiousness, extraversion, agree-ableness, emotional stability and openness. Those dimensions where measured using a Likert scale with 6 points. In total, 107 survey interviewers from a branch of private companies specialized in public opinion research answered the questionnaire's questions. Reliability of the questionnaire was assessed by internal consistency. A preliminary list of 25 items was prepared as a starting point. After evaluation of validity, five items were rejected. The new measurement instrument with 20 items was finally developed. The content validity index for the final questionnaire was found acceptable. Results showed that final questionnaire was internally consistent.

In the present paper, we analyse the determinants of employment growth in V4 countries. While a standard approach relies on the parametric estimation of labour elasticity coefficients, we employ a novel approach based on structural decomposition analysis. This allows us to identify several determinants which mitigate the effects of economic growth on employment. We decompose the overall change in employment into the contribution of six factors: changes in labour productivity, changes in the import of intermediate products, changes in the structure of production, changes in the final demand structure by industries and by sectors, and a change in final demand volume. We show that besides the generally accepted influence of labour productivity growth on employment, other factors such as structural changes and changes in final demand played an important role in employment changes. These results shed some light on low labour elasticity in V4 countries and go beyond the simple labour productivity growth argument.

This article investigates the employment development in Czech-based firms in German ownership in the years around the Great Recession of 2008/2009. The intense involvement of German firms in the economy of the neighbouring country via foreign direct investment (FDI) raises a question whether under the conditions of a historically deep global downturn, the Czech employees in multinational companies were confronted with an increased volatility of their jobs. Using a unique firm-level dataset, we contrast the affiliates of German investors with purely Czech-owned enterprises. Our findings indicate that in the years before the crisis, firms with German capital exhibited a noticeably more positive employment development. The results from the year 2008 onwards give reason to the conclusion that the German-owned firms played a stabilizing role for the Czech labour market during the recession.

We analyse labour market flows and unemployment rate dynamics in the Czech Republic (CR), Slovakia and Poland. Relative involvement of working-age individuals in movements between various labour market states appears to be approximately five times lower in Central Europe than in the U.S./UK. Compared to neighbouring countries, the CR suffers from a relatively weaker net flow of individuals from unemployment to employment. This net flow alone would cut the unemployment rate in Poland more than twice as fast as in the CR. In particular, currently unemployed Czech men, individuals with primary education, and the 55-65 age group are adversely affected by this national-specific feature of labour market flows.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the determinants of labour market dynamics in EU-27 in the recent period and to assess their impact on the process of economic development. The degree of originality is given by our choice to focus on the comparative analysis of two periods of time: 2000-2007, when the European Union as a whole, but especially Central and Eastern European countries as well as Mediterranean ones experienced significant improvements in labour market performances and overall competitiveness and 2008-2010, a recession period characterized by a massive loss of jobs and an equally large increase in unemployment, with anticipated consequences on economic growth. The main interest is to look for the key factors that determine the lasting performances of the leading European economies and possible solutions for ensuring the sustainable growth of the others.

This paper aims to quantify the impact of social benefits on labour market participation in the Czech Republic and provides a comparison with selected European countries. It applies the logistic regression to estimate the probability of labour market participation depending on social benefits related to net wage of the individuals, controlling for individual and household characteristics. Our results indicate that the work disincentives via social benefits do exist in most of the included countries and they proved to be relatively strong in the Czech Republic. When trying to understand the reasons for recently decreasing participation rate in the Czech Republic, the often called ""generous"" Czech social benefit system appears to be relevant.

This paper deals with present situation and future development of pension reform in the Czech Republic. A comparison with neighboring country - Austria, has been done. Parametrical reforms of pay as you go systems in both countries are compared and evaluated. Pretensions to introduce the multi-pillar pension system are commented and appraised. Some opacities in current definitions of private pension systems are mentioned. Specific risks of different pillars are introduced, together with the necessity to monitor costs of the pension administrative itself. Aging of the society and public budgets deficit are very important circumstances influencing the pension policy, however, the main aim of reforms should be the creation of a modern system, supporting the maintenance of the living standard of the elderly. Well functioning labour market and developed financial market for a modern pension system are indispensable.