The composite indicator "Quality of work" for comparing European countries is constructed from data of the Third European Survey on Working Conditions. The main findings are as follows: (a) European countries differ with respect to working conditions statistically more signi¯cantly than with...

Theory predicts that mandated employment protections may reduce productivity by distortingproduction choices. Firms facing (non-Coasean) worker dismissal costs will curtail hiringbelow efficient levels and retain unproductive workers, both of which should affectproductivity. These theoretical...

The European Social Survey data are used to analyze informal employment at the main jobin 30 countries. Overall, informality decreases from South to West to East to North. However,dependent work without contract is more prevalent in Eastern Europe than in the West,except for Ireland, the UK and...

The policy agenda of extending working lives requires a holistic understandingof factors underlying the decision of older workers to withdraw from work andto retire. This brief paper presents employment patterns and trends of olderpeople across EU Member States and identifies policy initiatives...

This paper analyses the economic disadvantage experienced by disabled personsof working-age using data from the British Household Panel Survey. We arguethat there are three sources of disadvantage among disabled persons: preexistingdisadvantage among those who become disabled (a ‘selection’...

In this paper we estimate the elasticity of the labour supply to a firm, using data from theHousehold, Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia (HILDA) Survey. Estimation of thiselasticity is of particular interest not only in its own right but also because of its relevance tothe debate about the...

We present a dynamic model where the probability of outsourcing production is increasing inthe firm’s expectation of technological change. As the pace of innovations in productiontechnologies increases, the less time the firm has to amortize the sunk costs associated withpurchasing and...

Portuguese firms engage in intense reallocation, most employers simultaneously hire andseparate from workers, resulting in a large heterogeneity of flows and excess turnover. Largeand older firms have lower flows, but high excess turnover rates. In small firms, hires andseparations move...