جریان کار ناخالص و موسسات در اروپا

We examine job flows in the 1990s for a sample of 13 European countries. By using a dataset of continuing firms that covers all sectors, we find firm characteristics to be important determinants of job flows, with smaller and younger firms within services typically having a larger degree of job turnover. Once controlled for firm and sectoral effects, the role of institutions in the dynamics of job creation and destruction is examined. As expected, employment protection is found to reduce job flows. Similarly, countries with higher unemployment benefits and more co-ordinated wage bargaining systems are characterised by lower job flows.

Recent literature has stressed the importance of job flows when firms and workers are heterogeneous and the matching process between vacancies and workers is costly. When a shock hits the economy, the desired allocation of jobs among firms and sectors changes, leading to simultaneous job creation and destruction. Because of heterogeneity and other labour market frictions, new vacancies and unemployed workers do not match instantaneously, implying spells of unemployment and vacant positions in the economy (Pissarides, 2000). Studies estimating job creation and destruction from plant or firm-level data show that a high number of jobs are simultaneously created and destroyed even when the employment growth is close to zero. This provides evidence on the complexity of the dynamics underlying the adjustment process in the labour market.

This paper presents an analysis of job flows for a panel of 13 European countries in the 1990s using a dataset of continuing firms that covers the whole spectrum of productive sectors and, given homogeneity in the definitions and sectoral coverage, permits cross-country comparisons. We estimate the joint effect of different firm characteristics on job flow rates. We find that both the size and age of the firm have a negative impact on job reallocation. Similarly, firms located in services typically exhibit stronger patterns of job flows than firms operating in manufacturing.