Measuring Job-Finding Rates and Matching Efficiency with Heterogeneous Jobseekers

Robert E. Hall and Sam Schulhofer-Wohl

No 20939, NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc

Abstract: Matching efficiency is the productivity of the process for matching jobseekers to available jobs. Job-finding is the output; vacant jobs and active jobseekers are the inputs. Measurement of matching efficiency follows the same principles as measuring an index of productivity of production. We develop a framework for measuring matching productivity when the population of jobseekers is heterogeneous. The efficiency index for each type of jobseeker is the monthly job finding rate for the type adjusted for the overall tightness of the labor market. We find that overall matching efficiency declined smoothly over the period from 2001 through 2013. Measures of matching efficiency that neglect heterogeneity among the unemployed and also neglect jobseekers other than the unemployed suggest a 23 percent decline in efficiency between 2007 and 2009. We demonstrate that essentially all of this apparent decline results from changes in the composition of jobseekers rather than any true movement in efficiency. We also develop a new approach to measuring matching rates that avoids counting short-duration jobs as job-seeking successes.

JEL-codes: E24 J63 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2015-02
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-eff, nep-lab and nep-mac
Note: EFG LS
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (22)

Published as Robert E. Hall & Sam Schulhofer-Wohl, 2018. "Measuring Job-Finding Rates and Matching Efficiency with Heterogeneous Job-Seekers," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 10(1), pages 1-32, January.

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Related works:
Journal Article: Measuring Job-Finding Rates and Matching Efficiency with Heterogeneous Job-Seekers (2018)
Working Paper: Measuring Job-Finding Rates and Matching Efficiency with Heterogeneous Jobseekers (2015)
Working Paper: Measuring Job-Finding Rates and Matching Efficiency with Heterogeneous Jobseekers (2015)
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