Does the ILO Definition Capture All Unemployment?

Andrea Brandolini (), Piero Cipollone () and Eliana Viviano ()
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Eliana Viviano: Bank of Italy, Research Department, Milan Branch

No 529, Temi di discussione (Economic working papers) from Bank of Italy, Economic Research Department

Abstract: The labour market status of many non-working persons is at the boundary between unemployment and inactivity. Like the unemployed, they seek and are available for work; unlike them, their last search action was not recent enough to meet the ILO definition of unemployment. In this paper we examine by non-parametric tests how the transition probabilities of these out-of-the-labour-force job seekers differ from those of the unemployed as well as the other non-participants. First, using data from the European Community Household Panel, we show that in most EU countries these job seekers constitute a distinct labour market state. Second, we rely on information only available in the Italian Labour Force Survey to derive a measure of search intensity which we use to break down the out-of-the-labour-force job seekers. On the basis of their transition probabilities, the most active are indistinguishable from the unemployed.

Keywords: unemployment; ILO classifications; transition probabilities (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: J64 J22 R23 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-geo
Date: 2004-12
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Related works:
Journal Article: Does The Ilo Definition Capture All Unemployment? (2006)
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Persistent link: http://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:bdi:wptemi:td_529_04

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