Rise In Unemployment Research Articles

Expanding the Impact of the Psychology of Working: Engaging Psychology in the Struggle for Decent Work and Human Rights

Building on new developments in the psychology of working framework (PWF) and psychology of working theory (PWT), this article proposes a rationale and research agenda for applied psychologists and career development professionals to contribute to the many challenges related to human rights and decent work. Recent and ongoing changes in the world are contributing to a significant loss of decent work, including a rise of unemployment, underemployment, and precarious work across the globe. By failing to satisfy human needs for economic survival, social connection, and self-determination, the loss of decent work undermines individual and societal well-being, particularly for marginalized groups and those without highly marketable skills. Informed by innovations in the PWF/PWT, we offer exemplary research agendas that focus on examining the psychological meaning and impact of economic and social protections, balancing caregiving work and market work, making work more just, and enhancing individual capacities for coping and adapting to changes in the world of work. These examples are intended to stimulate new ideas and initiatives for psychological research that will inform and enhance efforts pertaining to work as a human right.

Impact of unemployment and income on entrepreneurship in post-apartheid South Africa: 1994–2015

Background: South Africa has made significant progress since the dawn of democracy in 1994. It registered positive economic growth rates and its real gross domestic product (GDP) per capita increased from R42 849 in 1994 to over R56 000 in 2015. However, employment growth lagged behind GDP growth, resulting in rising unemployment. Aim and setting: Entrepreneurship brings together labour and capital in generating income, output and employment. According to South Africa’s National Development Plan, employment growth would come mainly from small-firm entrepreneurship and economic growth. Accordingly, this article investigates the impact unemployment and per capita income have on early stage total entrepreneurship activity (TEA) in South Africa, using data covering the 1994–2015 period. Methods: The methodology used is the dynamic least squares regression. The article tests the assertion that economic growth, proxied by real per capita GDP income, promotes entrepreneurship and that high unemployment forces necessity entrepreneurship. Results: The regression results indicate that per capita real GDP, which increases with economic growth, has a highly significant, positive impact on entrepreneurial activity, while unemployment has a weaker effect. A 1% rise in real per capita GDP results in a 0.16% rise in TEA entrepreneurship, and a 1% rise in unemployment is associated with a 0.25% rise in TEA. Conclusion: There seems to be a strong pull factor, from income growth to entrepreneurship and a reasonable push from unemployment to entrepreneurship, as individuals without employment are forced to self-employment as a necessity, survival mechanism. Overall, a long-run co-integrating relationship seems plausible between unemployment, income and entrepreneurship in South Africa.

French Immigration—Demography Meets Politics: A Review Essay

French Immigration—Demography Meets Politics: A Review Essay

Economic Growth and Unemployment Rate: An Empirical Study of Indian Economy

Unemployment has been a major problem for India from a long time. The problem of unemployment is a global phenomenon, with international bodies like ILO predicting the rise in unemployment in India in coming years. The study attempts to find out the effect of economic growth on unemployment rate in India. Gross Domestic Product has been considered as an indicator of economic growth for the study. The data regarding GDP and unemployment rate have been collected from secondary sources like WorldBank database. Correlation and Regression analysis have been used to study the nature and degree of effect of economic growth on unemployment rate. It has been found that there is a strong negative correlation between economic growth and unemployment rate. Also, it was found that GDP accounts for 48% of cause of change in unemployment rate. The findings are in line with the Okun’s law and the conclusions of studies conducted in the past.

Turbulence and the employment experience of older workers

This paper provides new interpretations of the effects of rising economic turbulence—an increase in the rate of skill depreciation upon job loss—and its interaction with labor market institutions. We have three main results, based on a life‐cycle model with labor market frictions and labor force participation decisions. First, rising economic turbulence during the 1970s and 1980s accounts for the decline in employment among older workers in the United States. Second, the interaction between turbulence and institutions explains most of the reduction in labor force participation among older workers in Europe over this period, but ultimately explains little of the rise in unemployment. Third, only a small share of the increase in unemployment can be attributed to the early retirement policies that were implemented in Europe from the 1970s up until the early 1990s. Our analysis indicates that incorporating an operative labor supply choice can pose serious challenges to theories aiming to explain the European unemployment problem. Job search job loss turbulence European unemployment labor force participation E24 J21 J64

The labor market in New Zealand, 2000–2017

New Zealand is a small open economy, with large international labor flows and skilled immigrants. Since 2000, employment growth has kept pace with strong migration-related population growth. While overall employment rates have remained relatively stable, they have increased substantially for older workers. In contrast, younger workers as well as the Maori and Pasifika ethnic groups experienced a sharp decline in employment rates and a rise in unemployment around the time of the global financial crisis. Wage gains have been modest and there has been a compression of earnings differentials by gender as well as by skill.

New Generation Cooperatives as a Response to the Economic Crisis in Greece

The severe Greek economic crisis has created several financial and social challenges. The rise in unemployment had a consequence that a significant percentage of city-dwellers had to leave their homes mostly in Athens and continue their life in rural areas of Greece. Small agricultural holdings that were inherited and never utilized in the years of economic prosperity are now utilized. New business structures have emerged to tackle unemployment and the loss of income. As a result, the first new generation cooperative (NGC) named Efkarpon was established in Karditsa, Greece, in 2012. It is a vertically integrated cooperative, which uses innovation in production and processing of superfood fruits. Factor analysis and SWOT analysis are used to specify the cooperative potentials and manage members' expectations. The results reveal that the members joined in the Efkarpon mostly because they liked the innovative attributes of the effort and recognized entrepreneurial opportunities in superfoods. The credibility of the pioneers of this innovative venture seem to have played the key role.

The labor market in Australia, 2000–2016

Since 1991, the Australian economy has experienced sustained economic growth. Aided by the commodities boom and strong public finances, the Australian economy negotiated the global financial crisis without falling into recession. Over this period there were important structural changes, with increasing labor force participation among the elderly and the continuing convergence of employment and unemployment patterns for men and women. However, some recent negative trends include a rise in unemployment, especially long-term unemployment, a deteriorating youth labor market, and a stagnant gender earnings gap.

Unemployment and Development

This paper draws on household survey data from countries of all income levels to measure how average unemployment rates vary with income per capita. We document that unemployment is increasing with GDP per capita. Furthermore, we show that this fact is accounted for almost entirely by low-educated workers, whose unemployment rates are strongly increasing in GDP per capita, rather than by high-educated workers, whose unemployment rates are not correlated with income. To interpret these facts, we build a model with workers of heterogeneous ability and two sectors: a traditional sector, in which self-employed workers produce output without reward for ability; and a modern sector, in which firms hire in frictional labor markets, and output increases with ability. Countries differ exogenously in the productivity level of the modern sector. The model predicts that as productivity rises, the traditional sector shrinks, as progressively less-able workers enter the modern sector, leading to a rise in overall unemployment and in the ratio of low-educated to high-educated unemployment rates. Quantitatively, the model accounts for around one third of the cross-country patterns we document.

ЦИФРОВАЯ ЭКОНОМИКА И НОВАЯ ПАРАДИГМА РЫНКА ТРУДА

The article attempts to understand the phenomenon of digitalization of the economy from the viewpoint of its social consequences. The author educes interrelations between a technological progress and processes occurring in the social and labor sphere in their inseparable unity, assesses their impact on the quality of working life and the prospects for development of the social sphere under new conditions. Analyzing the development logic of digital economy, which found its physical expression in digital platforms, the author gives distinctive examples of transformation specific for separate sectors of economy in various world regions. This generates a new economic reality, creating new areas: the economy on demand, gig-economy, network economy, sharing economy, joint consumption economy. The author notes that the possibilities for further extensive development of markets determine the fact that nowadays only those innovations are recognized which lead to cost savings. The digital economy technologies provide a manufacturer who produces goods “on demand” with opportunities for a significant reduction in costs. Under conditions that allow the extensive use of foreign resources in terms of outsourcing, these goods are not targeted at the mass consumer. From the social point of view, the main “side effect” of the massive use of digital platforms is a reduction in the demand for labor from a high-tech economy. As a result, labor markets of almost all countries are under serious pressure due to underutilization of human capital, owing not only to the rise of unemployment, but also to the widespread of underemployment. The author concludes: the digital economy is not merely the use of new technologies that enhance the efficiency of previous business processes, but rather an entirety of system changes. They form qualitatively new principles for organization of a separate business, the economy, and society as a whole, transforming social relations through a change of the social and labor sphere.

Una nueva generación española en Alemania. Análisis de las motivaciones para la emigración bajo el manto de la crisis

Esta contribución se enmarca en el estudio de los nuevos procesos de emigración del sur al norte de Europa en un contexto marcado por la crisis económica y el aumento sin precedentes de la tasa de paro. Concretamente, se aborda la emigración española que desde el año 2008 escoge como destino la ciudad de Hamburgo, en Alemania. El objetivo principal consiste en analizar las motivaciones para emigrar, enmarcándolas en procesos socioestructurales de carácter más amplio, al tiempo que se presenta un estudio de las percepciones en torno al perfil y características que tiene esta emigración a respecto de esta ola migratoria. La metodología que sustenta la investigación es de corte cualitativo y consiste en entrevistas semiestructuradas a emigrantes recientes en Hamburgo (Alemania), así como seguimiento de comunidades virtuales y observación participante.

Luxembourg

This Technical Note reviews the stability of Luxembourg’s financial system. The financial soundness indicators for Luxembourg’s financial system, which plays a key role in the intermediation of financial capital, have remained relatively robust in recent years. Household stress test results suggest that households’ solvency would be significantly affected by a drop in income and housing prices and a rise in unemployment. Bank liquidity displays broad resilience, but would be weakened should wholesale funding dry up or funding stress emerge in foreign currencies. Banks were found to be less vulnerable to direct contagion risk through bilateral exposure; however, most banks have considerable cross-border exposure.

Evidence of the added-worker and discouraged-worker effects in Australia

Gross flow data for workers moving between the states of employment, unemployment and non-participation in Australia can be used to analyse the likelihood of workers transitioning between the three states in different phases of the business cycle. We use correlation analysis and a SVAR model to determine the cyclicality of state transition rates and use these results to characterise labour force inflows and outflows as being consistent in aggregate with either the discouraged-worker effect (DWE) or the added-worker effect (AWE). We find evidence that the AWE is dominant in transitions in both directions between unemployment and non-participation which contributes to a rise in unemployment during economic contractions. We also find that the DWE is dominant in transitions from non-participation to employment and that this drives the overall result that non-participation rises during a contraction. This means that the overall participation rate is procyclical. It is important to understand the cyclical influences on labour force participation and its interaction with unemployment before framing policy responses which seek to reduce labour market slack.

The Role of Governments in Aligning Functional Income Distribution with Full Employment

:Demand is an incentive for investment. The latter is necessary to create employment. If demand lags behind supply, then unemployment and underemployment rise. Persistent unemployment and underemployment indicate a dysfunctional price mechanism. Then, only governments can stimulate demand. They may equalize ex ante saving and investment by public investment, income redistribution, or market regulation.

The impacts of the global financial crisis on hospitalizations due to depressive illnesses in Taiwan: A prospective nationwide population-based study

BackgroundIn the third quarter of 2008, a major financial crisis hit many developed countries. Taiwan suffered its own share: a rise in unemployment and a severe decline in gross domestic product. This study is to address the health consequences of this crisis on different socioeconomic populations in Taiwan. MethodsA sample of 6,225,766 men and 5,417,651 women, was obtained and their admissions data over 2007–2012 were retrieved. Stratified into three income levels, the sample was examined on the 147,921 episodes of hospitalization due to depressive illnesses (DIs) over that period by an interrupted time series analysis for monthly incidence rates of DI hospitalizations ResultsThe adjusted incidence rates of hospitalization (AIRH) for DIs among the low income were 10 times that of the high income group. The AIRHs were generally higher in all of three female income groups than they were in the three male income groups. The low income men and women showed increases (of 18.0% and 14.2%, respectively) beginning in April 2008 that sustained for two years. The high income women exhibited a 5.0% monthly rise in the rate of DI hospitalizations. LimitationsOur time series models can control some confounding factors, but the ecological fallacy remained. ConclusionsThis study provides evidence that the economic recession resulted in increased rates of DI hospitalization in Taiwan, especially among the low income population. Women of higher incomes may have suffered a more enduring impact.

Regional unemployment disparities in China

China has larger regional unemployment disparities than any other economy of comparable size. The persistence of the unemployment disparity in China has prevented the aggregate unemployment rate from decreasing even when the country’s GDP was growing at 10 percent per year. Unemployment rates rose and unemployment disparities widened in other transition economies too, but what made China’s disparities wider than those in other transition economies is the existence of a large subsistence sector, where unemployment exists only in a disguised form. This study explains the wide unemployment disparity in China with the geographically uneven distribution of the three sectors: the state sector, which suffers from a steep rise of unemployment during transition; the capitalist sector, which absorbs labor from the subsistence sector and grows rapidly; and the subsistence sector, which supplies its redundant labor to the capitalist sector. The study also presents a case study of Fuxin City, which has experienced an extremely high unemployment rate due to the reform of its main industry. Fuxin’s case is presented as a microcosm of the problems that give rise to unemployment disparities, such as massive layoffs in the state sector, lack of labor mobility in the unemployment-stricken regions, and inadequate development of the capitalist sector.

¿Economía capitalista monetaria sin deflación? (Enfoque circuitista-institucionalista)

Se inicia explicando qué es la "deflación" en su forma moderna: una crisis acumulativa de la economía real caracterizada por un aumento incontrolado del desempleo y la inflación. Después se enfatiza lo que se considera como las "leyes objetivas" fundamentales del sistema, confiando en su marco más general: un circuito monetario intertemporal. Se demuestra que la condición de existencia del sistema es el compromiso del Estado de ser el "arquitecto del futuro" a base de su siempre creciente inversión productiva en capital tangible e intangible. Abandonar al sector capitalista privado a si mismo está cada vez más paralizado debido a su creciente ansiedad por el futuro. Ese papel del Estado requiere que su inversión más importante se refleje en su buen déficit productivo que está libre de deuda efectiva (o deuda en si misma).

The macroeconomic effects of fiscal consolidation policies in Greece

PurposeThis paper aims to investigate the effects of contractionary fiscal policy shocks on major Greek macroeconomic variables within a structural vector autoregression framework while accounting for debt dynamics.Design/methodology/approachThe sign restriction approach is applied to identify a linear combination of government spending and government revenue shock simultaneously while accounting for debt dynamics. Additionally, output and unemployment responses to fiscal shocks under different scenarios concerning the amalgamation of austerity measures are considered.FindingsThe results indicate that a contractionary consumption policy shock, namely, a 1 per cent decrease in government consumption and a 1 per cent increase in indirect taxes, is preferred, as it produces a minor decrease in output and substantially decreases public debt, while a contractionary wage policy shock is suitable only when the government aims to sharply reduce public debt, as the consequences for the economy are harsh. A contractionary investment policy shock is not recommended, as it triggers a rise in unemployment and a fall in output, while the effect on the public debt is minor.Practical implicationsPolicymakers should focus their efforts on reducing unproductive government consumption on the expenditure side. Concerning revenues, the reinforcement of tax administration is recommended to ensure that indirect taxes will be collected.Originality/valueThis paper contributes to the existing literature by providing a disaggregated analysis of the effects of fiscal policy actions in Greece by implementing several fiscal policy scenarios and accounting for the level of public debt. All scenarios are in the vein of the economic adjustment programs guidelines.

Are the Spanish long-term unemployed unemployable?

Long-term unemployment reached unprecedented levels in Spain in the wake of the Great Recession and it still affects around 57% of the unemployed. We document the sources that contributed to the rise in long-term unemployment and analyze its persistence using state-of-the-art duration models. We find pervasive evidence of negative duration dependence, while personal characteristics such as mature age, lack of experience, and entitlement to unemployment benefits are key to understand the cross-sectional differences in the incidence of long-term unemployment. The negative impact of low levels of skill and education is muted by the large share of temporary contracts, but once we restrict attention to employment spells lasting at least 1 month these factors also contribute to a higher risk of long-term unemployment. Surprisingly, workers from the construction sector do not fare worse than similar workers from other sectors. Finally, self-reported reservation wages are found to respond strongly to the cycle, but much less to individual unemployment duration. In view of these findings, we argue that active labor market policies should play a more prominent role in the fight against long-term unemployment while early activation should be used to curb inflows.

The rise of technological unemployment and its implications on the future macroeconomic landscape

Recent technological advances in big data, machine learning, and robotics, have begun to have a negative influence on existing employment opportunities for human beings. Numerous studies have demonstrated a worrisome decline in low- and medium-income employment resulting from the replacement of human workforce with machines. A seminal study by Frey and Osborne in 2013 predicted that 47% of the 702 examined occupations in the United States faced a high risk of decreased employment rate within the next 10–25 years as a result of computerization. Despite the seemingly dystopian future foreshadowed by these numbers, the wholesale replacement of labor by machines will most likely not become a reality in the foreseeable future for an array of reasons, including the creativity required by many occupations and interventions by governments.However, despite the barriers, computerization is likely to have a significant effect on the current market. In this paper, we aim to track the relative quantities of jobs that are either susceptible or non-susceptible to computerization in the future, by developing and utilizing an analytical model using Markov chains. Various simulations performed using this model demonstrate the importance of intervention policies, such as improved technical education of the public, in controlling the rate of computerization. Moreover, the simulations identify the probable creation of new jobs that would facilitate new human employment. Although radical changes in technology and economy await humanity, adequate preparation will help to facilitate a smoother transition into the age of computers.