Based on Eurostat data the Macroeconomic Policy Institute (IMK) regularly analyses the development of labour costs and unit labour costs in Europe. This report presents labour cost trends in the private sector, disaggregated for private as well as public services, and in manufacturing industry,...

In the last decade economic policy in Germany was strongly focused on supply-side policies, and the demand side was mainly ignored. Labour-market and welfare-state reforms reduced firms' costs from wages, social security contributions, and taxes. The aim was to increase incentives for job...

This paper investigates the reasons for the exceptionally robust performance of the German labour market during the Great Recession. While GDP dropped by more than five per cent in 2009, employment remained constant and started to increase soon after. We compare this recession to other major...

Despite the biggest economic slump in Germany since the Second World War, employment did not decrease. In other European countries, which have even been hit less hard, employment started to decrease significantly. This 'employment miracle' is a result of the high internal flexibility of the...

Based on data from Eurostat the Macroeconomic Policy Institute (IMK) regularly analyses the development of labour costs and unit labour costs in Europe. This report presents labour cost trends in the private sector, and disaggregated for private services and manufacturing industry, for a...

This article analyses the relevance of the extensive and the intensive margin of labour adjustment over the business cycle in Germany and in the United States. Previous research has found that, firstly, the extensive margin dominates and that, secondly, the relative relevance of the two margins...

Based on Eurostat data the Macroeconomic Policy Institute (IMK) regularly analyses the development of labour costs and unit labour costs in Europe. This report presents labour cost trends in the private sector, disaggregated for private as well as public services and manufacturing industry, for...