Working Paper 123 - Labor Market Dynamics in Tunisia: The Issue of Youth Unemployment

This paper analyzes the dynamics of the youth labor market in Tunisia using unique labor force survey data from 2005 to 2007 that include a longitudinal component. It first shows that sustained economic growth will reduce youth unemployment over the next few years. Second, forecasts indicate that the growth of private sector services has the highest potential to reduce youth unemployment. Third, the analysis of labor market characteristics reveals that young graduates experience long unemployment as they cue for high-skill jobs. Moreover, the public sector remains the main provider of employment opportunities for many graduates, in particular for women.

Working Paper 106 - Does Human Capital Protect Workers against Exogenous Shocks? South Africa in the 2008 - 2009 Crisis

The financial and economic crisis of 2008and 2009 has taken its toll on the SouthAfrican economy. The economy contractedfor the first time since 1998, and enteredrecession during the fourth quarter of 2008.The GDP contraction was soon transmittedto the labor market. Between the secondquarters of 2008 and 2009, employment fellby 3.8 percent. However, not all individualswere hit with the same intensity. Using laborforce survey data unique in the Africancontext, we find that human capital provideda buffer against the shock. After controllingfor observable characteristics, education andexperience showed the potential to entirelyoffset the effect of the recession on thelikelihood of employment. This has importantpolicy implications, as it strengthens thecase for strategic investments in humancapital, and helps identifying the unskilled asthose with the highest need for social safetynet interventions during the recession.

Labor Market Dynamics in Tunisia: The Issue of Youth Unemployment

This paper analyzes the dynamics of the youth labor market in Tunisia using unique labor force survey data from 2005 to 2007 that include a longitudinal component. It first shows that sustained economic growth will reduce youth unemployment over the next few years. Second, forecasts indicate that the growth of private sector services has the highest potential to reduce youth unemployment. Third, the analysis of labor market characteristics reveals that young graduates experience long unemployment as they cue for high-skill jobs. Moreover, the public sector remains the main provider of employment opportunities for many graduates, in particular for women.labor market, Tunisia, unemployment, youth

Working Paper 110 - Education and Employment in Malawi

This paper analyzes the relationship betweeneducation and employment in Malawi, usingdata from the 2004-05 Integrated HouseholdSurvey (IHS-2). For both men and women,education is the passport to formalemployment and leads to higher hourlyearnings. Within regular wage employment,secondary education is associated with a123 percent wage premium, and universityeducation with a 234 percent wage premium(relative to illiteracy). In both rural and urbanareas, income is positively correlated withspecialization in regular wage employment.For example, in urban areas 60 percent of thehouseholds who derive at least 75 percent oftheir income from regular wage employmentbelong to the highest quartile of the incomedistribution. This reflects the relative scarcityof human capital. Among prime age males(25 to 39 years old), only 10 percent havecompleted secondary education. For womenin the same age group, the situation is evenworse, with the rate of completion ofsecondary schooling as low as 3 percent.The analysis of school enrolment highlightsthat teenage women experience high dropoutrates, which prevent greater femaleenrollment in higher education, and thereforeconstrain future participation in the bestforms of employment.

Does Human Capital Protect Workers against Exogenous Shocks? South Africa in the 2008-2009 Crisis

The financial and economic crisis of 2008 and 2009 has taken its toll on the South African economy. The economy contracted for the first time since 1998, and entered recession during the fourth quarter of 2008. The GDP contraction was soon transmitted to the labor market. Between the second quarters of 2008 and 2009, employment fell by 3.8 percent. However, not all individuals were hit with the same intensity. Using labor force survey data unique in the African context, we find that human capital provided a buffer against the shock. After controlling for observable characteristics, education and experience showed the potential to entirely offset the effect of the recession on the likelihood of employment. This has important policy implications, as it strengthens the case for strategic investments in human capital, and helps identifying the unskilled as those with the highest need for social safety net interventions during the recession.labor markets, South Africa, financial crisis, human capital, business cycle, emerging economies

Tax reforms and environmental policies for Italy

This paper focuses on the relationship between tax reforms and environmental quality in Italy. First, we analyse some of the characteristics of the tax system. Within a dynamic model, we estimate the marginal distortion introduced by different taxes and show that the system is far from being optimal, at least in terms of efficiency. We then consider some possible tax reforms, keeping into account both the effect on utility and the impact on pollution. Finally, we design a tax reform with a specific environmental goal, i.e. the reduction of polluting emissions by 10%, and show the economic effects of this policy

Labour mobility during transition: evidence from Georgia

This paper deals with labour mobility in Georgia during economic transition. We use quarterly 1998-99 panel data to examine mobility across six labour market statuses (inactivity, unemployment, firmal wage employment, infirmal wage employment, selfemployment and firming). Our findings are consistent with the hypothesis of labour market segmentation. firmal employment is preferred to infirmal employment. Unemployment is largely a queuing device for individuals with higher education waiting for firmal jobs. Some self-employment is subsistence activities and consistent with a segmented labour market, while other is high risk and potentially high return activities. Age, gender and education are significant detfirminants of labour mobility. Finally, infirmal employment serves as a buffer in times of recession -with firming and infirmal wage employment absorbing labour shed by other statuses during the Russian financial crisis

No education, no good jobs? Evidence on the relationship between education and labor market segmentation

This paper assesses labor market segmentation across formal and informal salaried jobs and self-employment in three Latin American and three transition countries. It looks separately at the markets for skilled and unskilled labor, inquiring if segmentation is an exclusive feature of the latter. Longitudinal data are used to assess wage differentials and mobility patterns across jobs. To study mobility, the paper compares observed transitions with a new benchmark measure of mobility under the assumption of no segmentation. It finds evidence of a formal wage premium relative to informal salaried jobs in the three Latin American countries, but not in transition economies. It also finds evidence of extensive mobility across these two types of jobs in all countries, particularly from informal salaried to formal jobs. These patterns are suggestive of a preference for formal over informal salaried jobs in all countries. In contrast, there is little mobility between self-employment and formal salaried jobs, suggesting the existence of barriers to this type of mobility or a strong assortative matching according to workers' individual preferences. Lastly, for both wage differentials and mobility, there is no statistical difference across skill levels, indicating that the markets for skilled and unskilled labor are similarly affected by segmentation