Occupational job creation: patterns and implications

This paper empirically investigates the matching process of job seekers and job vacancies, on different occupational labor markets, and reveals the relative importance of supply and demand factors, and frictions in the job creation process. Using data from German administrative records, we estimate matching functions both on the aggregate level, and for different occupational and educational groups. The data allow to avoid some of the usual problems in empirical matching studies; extensive robustness and stationarity tests are carried out. The results indicate substantial heterogeneity in the matching processes at disaggregate levels. This information can be useful for policymakers, since policy interventions that are effective in creating employment on some occupational labor markets might lead to unsatisfactory results for other occupations. Copyright 2004, Oxford University Press.