Michael Svarer

Are Homeowners Really More Unemployed

A method of controlling Take-All disease of plants by applying a fungicide of the formula wherein Z1 and Z2 are C and are part of an aromatic ring which is benzothiophene; and A is selected from -C(X)-amine wherein the amine is an unsubstituted, monosubstituted or disubstituted amino radical, -C(O)-SR3, -NH-C(X)R4, and -C(=NR3)-XR7; B is -Wm-Q(R2)3 or selected from O-tolyl, 1-naphthyl, 2-naphthyl, and 9-phenanthryl, each optionally substituted with halogen or R4; Q is C, Si, Ge, or Sn; W is -C(R3)pH(2-p)-; or when Q is C, W is selected from -C(R3)pH(2-p), -N(R3)mH(1-m)-, -S(O)p-, and -O-; X is 0 or S; n is 0, 1, 2, or 3; m is 0 or 1; p is 0, 1, or 2; each R and R2 is independently defined herein; R3 is C1-C4 alkyl; R4 is C1-C4 alkyl, haloalkyl, alkoxy, alkylthio, alkylamino, or dialkylamino; and R7 is C1-C4 alkyl, haloalkyl, or phenyl, optionally substituted with halo, nitro, or R4; or an agronomic salt thereof.

The Threat Effect of Active Labour Market Programmes

In this paper, we estimate the threat effect of active labour market programmes (ALMPs) for a sample of unemployed men in Denmark. Threat effects of such programmes capture the impacts of a system of ALMPs prior to actual participation. Rational economic agents make search decisions based on the expected discounted value of unemployment, and the perceived risk of future participation in programmes may affect job-search behaviour early in the unemployment spell. We find a strong and significant threat effect, which is shown to reduce average unemployment duration by two and a half weeks.

The Role of Workfare in Striking a Balance between Incentives and Insurance in the Labour Market

Workfare policies are often introduced in labour market policies to improve the trade-off between incentives and insurance as an alternative to benefit reductions. Most of the debate on such policies has focussed on the direct effect of those participating in the scheme, and in particular the possible locking-in effect reducing job search. In a general equilibrium search framework, we show that the effects of workfare policies critically depend on the response of those not in the programme when they take into account that workfare is a condition for remaining eligible for unemployment benefits. This implies that unemployed not yet in workfare may search more for regular jobs, and employed may accept lower wages since the outside option becomes less attractive. Introduction of workfare policies into an unemployment insurance scheme is shown to contribute to a reduction in both open and total unemployment. It is also shown that the direct search effects of workfare policies are a poor indicator of the overall effect workfare policies have on labour market policies.

Home Ownership, Job Duration, and Wages

We investigate the impact of home ownership on individual job mobility and wages in Denmark. We find that home ownership has a negative impact on job-to-job mobility both in terms of transition into new local jobs and new jobs outside the local labour market. In addition, there is a clear negative effect of home ownership on the unemployment risk and a positive impact on wages. These results are robust to different strategies for correcting for the possible endogeneity of the home owner variable.

The response of youth unemployment to benefits, incentives, and sanctions

Abstract The decline in the youth unemployment rate in Denmark is nearly unique among OECD countries and merits study. In 1996, a radical labour market reform was implemented, the Youth Unemployment Programme (YUP), directed towards unemployed, low-educated youth. This paper analyses the effects of the implementation of the YUP. We investigate the duration of unemployment spells and the transition rates from unemployment to schooling and employment. Three effects are analysed: an announcement effect, a direct programme effect, and a sanction effect. We find that the YUP has been partially successful.

Estimating the Threat Effect of Active Labour Market Programmes

We combine two techniques to consistently estimate the effect of active labour market programmes and, in particular, active labour market policy regimes. Our aim is to explicitly estimate the threat effect of active labour market programmes. Based on Danish data (1998-2002) from administrative registers we find a strong and significantly positive threat effect. The threat effect is shown to reduce average unemployment duration by approximately three weeks. The implications of this result are discussed.

The Effect of Sanctions on Exit from Unemployment: Evidence from Denmark

This paper investigates the effect of sanctions of unemployment insurance benefits on the exit rate from unemployment for a sample of Danish unemployed. The findings are that even moderate sanctions have rather large effects. For both males and females, the exit rate increases by more than 100% following an imposition of a sanction. The paper exploits a rather large sample to elaborate on the basic findings. It is shown that the effect of sanctions wears out after around three months and that some groups of unemployed are more responsive to sanctions than others.

Is Your Love in Vain? Another Look at Premarital Cohabitation and Divorce.

In this paper we provide an empirical investigation of the association between premarital cohabitation and subsequent risk of divorce. Theoretically couples who cohabit before marriage should have a lower subsequent risk of divorce since cohabitation enables you to gather information about the match quality, and only good matches evolve into marriage. However, a considerable number of papers have come to the complete opposite conclusion. The counter-intuitive result has been justified with self-selection of cohabitants as the main argument. In the present paper, we provide new evidence concerning the relationship between premarital cohabitation and divorce.

Rent Control And Tenancy Duration

This paper investigates how rent control affects mobility in the Danish housing market. We apply a proportional hazard duration model, that encompasses both the presence of left truncated tenancy durations, right censored observations and allows for a very flexible specification of the time dependency of the hazard rate. Tenancy mobility is severely reduced by rent control. For a typical household in the private rental sector tenancy duration is found to be more than six years longer if the apartment belongs to the 10% most regulated units than if it belongs to the 10% least regulated units.  2002 Elsevier Science (USA). All rights reserved. JEL classification: C41; D45; L51; R31

Estimating Equilibrium Effects of Job Search Assistance

Identifying policy-relevant treatment effects from randomized experiments requires the absence of spillovers between participants and nonparticipants (SUTVA) or variation in observed treatment levels. We find that SUTVA is violated for a Danish activation program for unemployed workers. Using a difference-in-differences model, we show that nonparticipants in the experiment regions find jobs more slowly after the introduction of the program than workers in other regions. We estimate an equilibrium search model to identify the policy-relevant treatment effect. A large-scale rollout of the program is shown to decrease welfare, while a standard partial microeconometric cost-benefit analysis concludes the opposite.