Internal Migration and Regional Population Dynamics in Europe: Czech Case Study

Report prepared for the Council of Europe (Directorate of Social and Economic Affairs, Population and Migration Division) and for European Commission (Directorate General V, Employment, Industrial Relations and Social Affairs, Unit E1, Analysis and Research on the Social Situation) Czech Republic has experienced, over the last decade, quite a balanced population system with low growth. This has changed recently and from 1994 we noted a decrease in population partially offset by international migration, for the time being mainly temporary labour circular movements. The decreasing trend may well continue due to future replacement in the reproductive ages of large female cohorts with much smaller cohorts, currently aged 0-15 years. Ales and Simek (1996) expect by the year 2020 a population decrease of at least 471 thousand (high variant). International migration will probably reduce to some extent the effect of negative natural increase. In terms of population dynamics the most important feature we have observed is slow but clear deconcentration of population from large cities to suburban areas. The main gains are observed in medium size towns and smaller communities at the expense of large cities and rural areas. However, the migration factor plays a lesser role than in the past. Net migration is low and migration effectiveness is very limited. The relationship between migration and other variables (population density, level of urbanisation) is rather weak. Unemployment has limited negative impacts on migration flows. No doubt, this may change when the serious restructuring of industry starts and unemployment increases - an almost certain scenario given the Czech Republic's willingness to join the European Union. The main enigma of the Czech migration system is its future dynamics. So far migration has been low, but with the development of the economy, including the housing market, improvement of telecommunication and increasing wealth of the society one may expect that migration trends would contribute much more to the regional population dynamics. The large units for which migration data were available in the Czech Republic reduce the number of inter-unit migrations, increase the number of intra-unit migrations, and in effect blur the picture of mobility, which anyway is quite low. Another factor, which made the analysis somewhat difficult is the mixture of signals sent to the economy by the Czech government. This mixture has confused professional economists, not to speak of ordinary people

Structures and trends of unemployment in the Czech Republic and the Visegrad Group states

Structures and trends of unemployment in the Czech Republic and the Visegrad Group states Abstract Unemployment is one of the major global problem today. This diploma thesis deals with the development of the level of unemployment in the Czech Republic and international comparison with the countries of the European Union, especially with the states of the Visegrad Group states. The thesis is divided into the theoretical and practical part. The theoretical part focuses on legislation related to unemployment, methodology and data sources, and also defines unemployment, its types and impacts. In the analytical part, there is described the development of unemployment in the Czech Republic from its origin to the present. Particular attention is paid to the year 2016, which was subjected to the analysis of unemployment in terms of demographic indicators such as gender, age, education and also according to individual regions of the Czech Republic. The work also compares the development of unemployment among Visegrad Group states from 2000 to 2016 and analyses the level of unemployment in terms of the highest education achieved between these countries in 2016. Keywords: Unemployment, unemployment structure, gender, age, education, legislation, methodology, labour force sample survey, Czech Republic, Visegrad Four...Struktury a trendy nezaměstnanosti v České republice a zemích Visegrádské čtyřky Abstrakt Nezaměstnanost je jedním z hlavních globálních problémů současnosti. Tato diplomová práce se zabývá vývojem úrovně nezaměstnanosti v České republice a mezinárodním porovnáním se zeměmi Evropské unie, zejména pak se státy Visegrádské čtyřky. Práce je rozdělena na teoretickou a praktickou část. Teoretická část je zaměřena na legislativu spojenou s nezaměstnaností, metodiku a zdroje dat, dále pak definuje nezaměstnanost, její druhy a dopady. V analytické části popisuje vývoj nezaměstnanosti v České republice od jejího vzniku až do současnosti. Zvláštní pozornost je věnována roku 2016, který byl podroben analýze nezaměstnanosti z hlediska demografických ukazatelů jako je pohlaví, věk, vzdělání a dále pak podle jednotlivých krajů České republiky. Práce následně porovnává vývoj úrovně nezaměstnanosti mezi státy Visegrádské čtyřky od roku 2000 až do roku 2016 a analyzuje úroveň nezaměstnanosti z hlediska nejvyššího dosaženého vzdělání mezi těmito zeměmi v roce 2016. Klíčová slova: Nezaměstnanost, struktury nezaměstnanosti, pohlaví, věk, vzdělání, legislativa, metodika, výběrové šetření pracovních sil, Česká republika, Visegrádská čtyřka, Polsko, Maďarsko, SlovenskoKatedra demografie a geodemografieDepartment of Demography and GeodemographyPřírodovědecká fakultaFaculty of Scienc

Unemployment Convergence in Transition

In this paper an attempt is made to inquire the dynamics of regional unemployment rates in transition economies. We use policy relevant NUTS4 unemployment rates for transition economies characterised by both relatively intense (Poland, Slovaka) and relatively mild labour market hardships (namely Czech Republic). We apply diverse analytical techniques to seek traces of convergence, including beta - and sigma-convergence as well as time-series approach. Results in each of the countries suggest no support in favour of beta-type convergence, i.e. convergence of levels. Even controlling for nation-wide labour market outlooks (conditional convergence) does not provide any support for this hypothesis. Further, regions with both very high and very low unemployment show signs of high persistence and low mobility in the national distribution, while the middle ones tend to demonstrate higher mobility and essentially no regional unemployment differentials persistence. This diagnosis is confirmed by sigma-convergence analysis which indicates no general divergence or convergence patterns. Transitions seem to be more frequent, but at the same time less sustainable for middle range districts, while movements up and down the ladder occur frequently for the same districts. Findings allow to define the patterns of local labour market dynamics, pointing to differentiated divergence paths. Importantly, these tendencies persist despite cohesion policies financing schemes, which allocate relatively more resources to deprived regions in all these countries.unemployment, beta-type convergence, sigma-type convergence, stochastic convergence, social cohesion

Explaining Gender Differences in Unemployment with Micro Data on Flows in Post-Communist Economies

Post-communist labor markets provide an interesting laboratory since unemployment rates grew from zero to double digits and gender differences began to vary greatly across these countries. We provide the first systematic analysis of the determinants of the gender unemployment gap in the Czech Republic using a method that decomposes unemployment rates into transition probabilities (flows) between labor market states, which we calculate using Labor Force Survey data. We extend the analysis to other post-communist economies by evaluating the flows available from existing studies with the decomposition framework. We further examine the flows in the Czech Republic by estimating gender-specific multinomial logit models to learn which factors (demographic, regional, cyclical) other than gender and marital status affect unemployment. We find that women’s lower probability of exiting unemployment for a job explains the lion’s share of the gender gap in the unemployment rates in the Czech Republic and the other post-communist countries for which studies exist. This is also the principal factor explaining married women’s higher unemployment rates compared to married men in the Czech Republic. On the other hand, single men and women’s rates are higher than married men and women’s because they are twice as likely to lose/leave a job for unemployment. We find that age and education are systematically important in explaining flows of both men and women in all these economies, as it is in the more developed industrial economies. The less educated are more likely to be laid off or quit and less likely to find a job. Whereas younger individuals are more likely to be laid off or quit, they are also more likely to find a job.http://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/39891/3/wp506.pd

Regional Poverty and Income Inequality in Central and Eastern Europe: Evidence from the Luxembourg Income Study

poverty, income inequality, regions, Central and Eastern Europe

Unemployment Convergence in Transition

In this paper an attempt is made to inquire the dynamics of regional unemployment rates in transition economies. We use policy relevant NUTS4 unemployment rates for transition economies characterised by both relatively intense (Poland, Slovaka) and relatively mild labour market hardships (namely Czech Republic). We apply diverse analytical techniques to seek traces of convergence, including beta - and sigma-convergence as well as time-series approach. Results in each of the countries suggest no support in favour of beta-type convergence, i.e. convergence of levels. Even controlling for nation-wide labour market outlooks (conditional convergence) does not provide any support to this hypothesis. Further, regions with both very high and very low unemployment show signs of high persistence and low mobility in the national distribution, while the middle ones tend to demonstrate higher mobility and essentially no regional unemployment differentials persistence. This diagnosis is confirmed by sigma-convergence analysis which indicates no general divergence or convergence patterns. Transitions seem to be more frequent, but at the same time less sustainable for middle range districts, while movements up and down the ladder occur frequently for the same districts. Findings allow to define the patterns of local labour market dynamics, pointing to differentiated divergence paths. Importantly, these tendencies persists despite cohesion policies financing schemes, which allocate relatively more resources to deprived regions in all these countries.unemployment, beta-type convergence, sigma-type convergence, stochastic convergence, social cohesion

Responses of Private and Public Schools to Voucher Funding: The Czech and Hungarian Experience

A state monopoly in schooling followed the collapse of communism in Central Europe. The centrally planned system was abandoned. Systems comparable with educational voucher scheme, also known as school choice system, were introduced in the Czech Republic and Hungary in the early 1990s. The newly established system of school financing allocates public funds according to the number of students enrolled in a school. Accredited non-state schools, private and religious, are also eligible for public subsidies. The scope and the form of these reforms represent a unique opportunity to test conflicting hypotheses of proponents and opponents of the voucher scheme. In this empirical analysis, we test fundamental theoretical predictions of the voucher model. Specifically, we test: i) whether non-state schools are established at locations where the supply of educational opportunities provided by state schools is low or of low quality, ii) whether state and non-state schools in such a system respond to changes in demand for education, and iii) whether state schools respond to competition from non-state schools. We use detailed school level data on the whole population of schools and data on regional conditions. In our econometric model we estimate education value added, instead of relying on absolute quality of school graduates. We find that non-state schools emerge at locations with excess demand and lower quality state schools. We also find that greater competition from non-state schools creates incentives for state schools with the result that state schools slightly improve the quality of educational inputs used and significantly improve their output, quality of graduates. As concerns the technical schools, we find that non-state schools react to regional labor market conditions in terms of technical branch premium and unemployment rate. We do not find such reactions to market signals by state schools. We introduce this analysis with a review of non-state schools' development in the Czech Republic and Hungary during the 1990s.http://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/39744/3/wp360.pd

Did political constraints bind during transition? Evidence from Czech elections 1990 - 2002

Many theoretical models of transition are driven by the assumption that economic decision making is subject to political constraints. In this paper we empirically test whether the winners and losers of economic reform determined voting behaviour in the first five national elections in the Czech Republic. We propose that voters, taking stock of endowments from the planning era, could predict whether they would become “winners” or “losers” of transition. Using survey data we measure the percentage of individuals by region who were “afraid” and “not afraid” of economic reform in 1990. We define the former as potential “winners” who should vote for pro-reform parties, while latter are potential “losers” who should support left-wing parties. Using national election results and regional economic indicators, we demonstrate that there is persistence in support for pro-reform and communist parties driven by prospective voting based on initial conditions in 1990. As a result, we show that regional unemployment rates in 2002 are good predictors of regional voting patterns in 1990.