Changes in Unemployment Duration and Labor Force Attachment

Katharine Abraham and Robert Shimer

No 8513, NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc

Abstract: This paper accounts for the observed increase in unemployment duration relative to the unemployment rate in the U.S. over the past thirty years, typified by the record low level of short-term unemployment. We show that part of the increase is due to changes in how duration is measured, a consequence of the 1994 Current Population Survey redesign. Another part is due to the passage of the baby boomers into their prime working years. After accounting for these shifts, most of the remaining increase in unemployment duration relative to the unemployment rate is concentrated among women, whose unemployment rate has fallen sharply in the last two decades while their unemployment duration has increased. Using labor market transition data, we show that this is a consequence of the increase in women's labor force attachment.

JEL-codes: J11 J64 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2001-10
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-ltv
Note: EFG LS
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (89)

Published as Krueger, Alan and Robert Solow (eds.) The Roaring Nineties. New York: The Russell Sage Foundation, 2002.

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