@article{SnowerBrownMerkl, author = {Snower, Dennis and Brown, Alessio and Merkl, Christian}, title = {Globalization and the Welfare State}, series = {Journal of Economic Literature}, volume = {47}, journal = {Journal of Economic Literature}, doi = {10.1257/jel.47.1.136}, pages = {136 -- 158}, language = {en} } @article{BrownMerklSnower, author = {Brown, Alessio and Merkl, Christian and Snower, Dennis}, title = {In Incentive Theory of Matching}, series = {Macroeconomic Dynamics}, volume = {19}, journal = {Macroeconomic Dynamics}, number = {3}, doi = {10.1017/S1365100513000527}, pages = {643 -- 668}, abstract = {This paper presents a theory explaining the labor market matching process through microeconomic incentives. There are heterogeneous variations in the characteristics of workers and jobs,and firms face adjustment costs in responding to these variations. Matches and separations are described through firms' job offer and firing decisions and workers' job acceptance and quit decisions. This approach obviates the need for a matching function. On this theoretical basis, we argue that the matching function is vulnerable to the Lucas critique. Our calibrated model for the U.S. economy can account for important empirical regularities that the conventional matching model cannot.}, language = {en} } @article{BrownMerklSnower, author = {Brown, Alessio and Merkl, Christian and Snower, Dennis}, title = {The Minimum Wage from a Two-Sided Perspective}, series = {Economics Letters}, volume = {124}, journal = {Economics Letters}, number = {3}, doi = {10.1016/j.econlet.2014.06.020}, pages = {389 -- 391}, abstract = {This paper sheds new light on the effects of the minimum wage on employment from a two-sided theoretical perspective, in which firms' job offer and workers' job acceptance decisions are disentangled. Minimum wages reduce job offer incentives and increase job acceptance incentives. We show that sufficiently low minimum wages may do no harm to employment, since their job-offer disincentives are countervailed by their job-acceptance incentives.}, language = {en} } @article{BrownOrszagSnower, author = {Brown, Alessio and Orszag, J. Michael and Snower, Dennis}, title = {Unemployment Accounts and Employment Incentives}, series = {European Journal of Political Economy}, volume = {24}, journal = {European Journal of Political Economy}, number = {3}, doi = {10.1016/j.ejpoleco.2008.06.006}, pages = {587 -- 604}, abstract = {We explore the far-reaching implications of replacing current unemployment benefit (UB) systems by an unemployment accounts (UAs) system. Under the UAs system, employed people are required to make ongoing contributions to their UAs and the balances in these accounts are available to them during periods of unemployment. The government is able to undertake balanced-budget interpersonal redistributions among the UAs. At the end of their working lives, people could transfer the remaining balances on their UAs into their pensions. We present an analytical framework to analyse the incentive effects of UAs and calibrate our model for the high high-unemployment countries of Europe. Our results suggest that this policy reform would significantly change people's employment incentives and could achieve reductions in unemployment without reducing the level of support to the unemployed.}, language = {en} } @article{BrownKohlbrecherMerkletal., author = {Brown, Alessio J. G. and Kohlbrecher, Britta and Merkl, Christian and Snower, Dennis}, title = {The effects of productivity and benefits on unemployment: Breaking the link}, series = {Economic Modelling}, journal = {Economic Modelling}, doi = {10.1016/j.econmod.2020.02.037}, abstract = {In the standard macroeconomic search and matching model of the labor market, there is a tight link between the quantitative effects of (i) aggregate productivity shocks on unemployment and (ii) unemployment benefits on unemployment. This tight link is at odds with the empirical literature. We show that a two-sided model of labor market search where the household and firm decisions are decomposed into job offers, job acceptances, firing, and quits can break this link. In such a model, unemployment benefits affect households' behavior directly, without having to run via the bargained wage. A calibration of the model based on U.S. JOLTS data generates both a solid amplification of productivity shocks and a moderate effect of benefits on unemployment. Our analysis shows the importance of investigating the effects of policies on the households' work incentives and the firms' employment incentives within the search process.}, language = {en} }