The Great Recession pushed Japan’s unemployment rate to historic highs, but the increase has been small by international standards and small relative to the large output shock. This paper explores Japan’s cyclical labor market response to the global financial crisis. Our findings suggest...

Despite its low unemployment rate, the recent shift in the Japanese Beveridge curve indicates increased labor mismatch. This paper quantifies the age, employment-type (full or part-time), and occupational mismatch in the Japanese labor market following Sahin and others (2013). Between April 2000...

Existing economic indicators and indexes assess economic activity but no single indicator measures the general macro-economic performance of a nation, state, or region in a methodologically simple and intuitive way. This paper proposes a simple, yet informative metric called the Economic...

The Belgian economy showed considerable progress through 2011 in terms of both growth and employment. However, the 2013 Article IV Consultation underlines that the European recession has had a negative impact on its economy, giving rise to unemployment. The economy has entered its second year of...

This 2013 Article IV Consultation highlights that following a sharp downturn in 2009 in the context of the global economic and financial crisis, Slovakia emerged as one of the fastest-growing economies in the European Union, supported in particular by substantial foreign investment in the auto...

The Sixth Five Year Plan, as outlined in Bangladesh's Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper, targets strategic growth and employment. The medium-term macroeconomic framework plan entails the involvement of both the private and public sectors. Human resources development strategy programs reaching out...

This technical note assesses the vulnerabilities of household and corporate sector balance sheets and quantifies the potential impacts from macroeconomic shocks using sensitivity and contingent claims analyses. The note analyzes the risks to the Spanish financial stability arising from household...

This paper discusses findings of the fourth review under an Extended Fund Facility Arrangement with Portugal. One year into the program, the authorities are making progress in reducing economic imbalances. The delicate balance between orderly deleveraging and improving competitiveness also...

JEL Cl This study constructs a new data set on unemployment rates in Latin America and the Caribbean and then explores the determinants of unemployment. We compare different countries, finding that unemployment is influenced by the size of the rural population and that the effects of government...

The review outlines a simple analytical model to explain the unemployment puzzle, especially the U-curve phenomenon. It analyzes the central institutional imperfections that characterize the existing Mauritian labor market and suggests possible reforms. It also reviews the IMF’s...