EVALUATION OF THE ACTIVE LABOR MARKET POLICIES IN THE REPUBLIC OF SRPSKA

This paper discusses the methods of evaluating active labor market policy. In addition, an important aspect of the analysis, conducted in this paper, concerns the assessment of the relative success of these measures in the case of the Republic of Srpska. The statistical analysis evaluated the success of three chosen projects implemented in the Republic of Srpska. A major problem in evaluating the effectiveness of individual measures is inadequate IT support. The unemployed persons are not monitored for all the characteristics that play a significant role in determining the target groups for particular measures. The measures are primarily intended for young people and categories related to the recent war conflicts in the former Yugoslavia. The relative assessment of the success of individual measures has confirmed that these measures are not greatly influenced by raising general employment, but these programs, at least to some extent, alleviate the problem of unemployment and improve the position of the hard-to-employ categories of the unemployed persons.

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Employers and the Implementation of Active Labor Market Policies

Nordic Journal of Working Life Studies ◽

10.19154/njwls.v6i1.4909 ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 6 (1) ◽

pp. 47 ◽

Cited By ~ 7

Author(s):

Thomas Bredgaard ◽

Jon Lystlund Halkjær

Keyword(s):

Labor Market ◽

Industrial Relations ◽

Historical Background ◽

Wage Subsidy ◽

Subsidy Scheme ◽

Labor Market Policies ◽

Active Labor ◽

Active Labor Market Policies ◽

The Unemployed ◽

Active Labor Market

Active labor market policies (ALMPs) are an important instrument for governments in dealing with the new challenges of globalization, flexibilization, and individualization of labor markets. Politics and research has focused on the supply-side of the labor market, that is, regulating the rights and obligations of the target groups of ALMPs (mainly unemployed and inactive persons). The role and behavior of employers is under-researched and under-theorized in the vast literature on ALMPs and industrial relations. In this article, we analyze ALMPs from the employers’ perspective by examining the determinants of firms’ participation in providing wage subsidy jobs for the unemployed. First, we examine the historical background to the introduction and development of wage subsidy schemes as an important ALMP instrument in Denmark. Second, we derive theoretical arguments and hypotheses about employers’ participation in ALMPs from selected theories. Third, we use data from a survey of Danish firms conducted in 2013 to characterize the firms that are engaged in implementing wage subsidy jobs and hypotheses are tested using a binary logistical regression to establish why firms voluntarily engage in reintegrating unemployed back into the labor market. We find that the firms which are most likely to participate in the wage subsidy scheme are characterized by many unskilled workers, a higher coverage of collective agreements, a deteriorating economic situation, a Danish ownership structure, and are especially found in the public sector. This shows that the preference formation of firms is more complex than scholars often assume.

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