scholarly journals Okun's law and assessment of stimulus to the economy of Bosnia and Herzegovina

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (2) ◽  
pp. 29-41
Author(s):  
Jasmin Halebić

The effects of coronavirus pandemics are omnipresent in the national economy of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Output and unemployment are probably the most important variables for measuring the negative effects of the pandemics from a macroeconomic perspective. Different organizations, both national and international, have announced their autumn and winter prognoses of these variables for 2020. None of them are optimistic. The Bosnian economy is in the worst situation in the last two decades. International Monetary Fund approved US$ 361 million in urgent support to B&H in 2020 to alleviate the COVID-19 negative economic consequences. This paper aims to investigate the potential economic impact of that financial support with the application of simple arithmetic. In the paper, Okun's law is used as a methodological framework to assessing the effects of the IMF's rapid financial instrument. The relationship between the real economic growth and change in the unemployment rate is estimated for the B&H economy. Findings of the paper show that the IMF financial support effect amounts to about 3.7% of GDP in B&H. Effects on the unemployment rate are estimated to 2.3 percentage points less than what it would otherwise have been. Since the early estimations of the GDP in B&H indicated a deep recession in 2020 this financial support proved to be an insufficient stimulus to the B&H economy. Decision-makers in the country should be aware of their responsibility for providing larger stimulus packages to avoid bad economic and social outcomes soon.

Economies ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 7 (4) ◽  
pp. 108
Author(s):  
Mindaugas Butkus ◽  
Janina Seputiene

The impact of economic fluctuations on the total unemployment rate is widely studied, however, with respect to age- and gender-specific unemployment, this relationship is not so well examined. We apply the gap version of Okun’s law, aiming to estimate youth unemployment rate sensitivity to output deviations from its potential level. Additionally, we aim to compare whether men or women have a higher equilibrium unemployment rate when output is at the potential level. Contrary to most studies on age- and gender-specific Okun’s coefficients, which assume that the effect of output on unemployment is homogenous, we allow a different effect to occur, depending on the output gap’s sign (positive/negative). The focus of the analysis is on 28 EU countries over the period of 2000–2018. The model is estimated by least squares dummy variable estimator (LSDV), using Prais–Winsten standard errors. We did not find evidence that higher equilibrium unemployment rates are more typical for men or for women. The estimates clearly show the equilibrium level of youth unemployment to be well above that of total unemployment, and this conclusion holds for both genders. We assess greater youth unemployment sensitivity to negative output shock, rather than to positive output shock, but when we take confidence intervals into consideration, this conclusion becomes less obvious.


1986 ◽  
Vol 46 (2) ◽  
pp. 341-352 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christina Romer

The paper examines in detail revised estimates of unemployment and gross national product for the United States before 1929. It first discusses the nature of the revisions to each series and contrasts the assumptions underlying the new data with those underlying the Kuznets GNP series and the Lebergott unemployment rate series. It then examines the business cycle properties of the new prewar estimates. In analyzes the volatility and serial correlation properities of the new macroeconomic series and investigates the Okun's Law relationship between unemployment and GNP, concluding with an evaluation of the assumptions underlying the old and new data.


2012 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 103-115 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christian Pierdzioch ◽  
Georg Stadtmann ◽  
Jan-Christoph Rülke

Abstract The quantity theory of money, Okun’s law, and the Phillips curve are cornerstones of macroeconomic theory. But are they also of practical relevance? Using survey data for the euro area, we found that professional economists’ forecasts are consistent with a version of the quantity theory in which forecasts of the growth rate of money supply correlate in a proportional way with forecasts of the inflation rate. We also found that forecasts of changes in the unemployment rate and forecasts of the growth rate of real output are consistent with Okun’s law. Evidence of a systematic link between forecasts of the inflation rate and forecasts of the unemployment rate, however, is not strong.


2017 ◽  
Vol 13 (28) ◽  
pp. 470
Author(s):  
Saleh Al-hosban ◽  
Mohmmad Edienat

The main aim of this study is to empirically examine ,investigate and test the relationship between unemployment rate and economic growth within Jordanian economy over the period of time (1982-2016), in order to examine the validity of Okun’s law, which suggests a negative relationship between unemployment rate and economic growth, several economic methods are employed by using descriptive statistics, as well as some econometric tests, in order to analyze the variables under study . The empirical results of this study show a negative relationship between unemployment and GDP in the period 1982-2016 in Jordanian economy, which is consistent with Okun’s law. In other word, this study offered an additional empirical evidence to confirm the validity of the Okun’s law in the case of Jordan over the period 1982-2016.So any attempt to increase economic growth through some economic policies such as expansion in spending would reduce unemployment rate, where the Okun’s coefficient of GDP with respect to unemployment rate is- 0.004, such that an increase of 100 million Jordanian Dinars in the Real GDP will cause 40% decrease in the unemployment rate, which is about half percent in unemployment rate in the next. The findings of this thesis may help economists and policymakers when adapting policies in order to adjust unemployment level in the economy.


Author(s):  
Brent Meyer ◽  
Murat Tasci

Okun’s law is a statistical relationship between unemployment and GDP that is widely used as a rule of thumb for assessing the unemployment rate—why it might be at a certain level or where it might be headed, for example. Unfortunately, the Okun’s law relationship is not stable over time, which makes it potentially misleading as a rule of thumb.


2017 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 97-110 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Christl ◽  
Monika Köppl-Turyna ◽  
Dénes Kucsera

AbstractWe estimate the classic and the dynamic variant of Okun’s law for the Austrian labor market. We find that, for recent periods, the growth rate necessary to stabilize the unemployment rate equals 2.8 percent. Moreover, we find that the rate has been growing in recent quarters due to the increasing labor force size and the effects of the crisis. The latest prediction of the employment threshold lies above 3 percent, much above forecasted GDP growth up to 2017.


10.23856/3203 ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 32 (1) ◽  
pp. 26-37
Author(s):  
Oluwaseyi Adedayo Adelowokan ◽  
Adeteji Olusegun Оkutimiren

The situation in Nigeria is rapid population growth with high level of unemployment rate. The theoretical proposition of the Okun’s law suggests an indirect relationship existing between unemployment and output growth. This study tests the validity of Okun’s law by examining the impact of youth employment generation on sustainable growth in the Nigerian economy. We modeled real gross domestic product against unemployment rate, population growth, labour and government expenditure between 1986 and 2017. The empirical findings show that there is short- and long- run relationship existing between unemployment rate, population growth and output growth in Nigeria. Hence, study recommends that the activities by the government in promoting economic growth in the country should be geared towards promoting employment for the people in other sector.


Author(s):  
Emirgena Nikolli

This thesis studies the relationship between the economic growth and the unemployment rate in Albania. This relation is known as Okun's law, which states that 1 percent decrease in unemployment; GDP will increase by 3 percent. Albania is one of the countries that have a sluggish development and impact of unemployment is negative in the economy of the country. At the same time the economy itself effect the employment of the people. The unemployment occurs when people are without work or seeking work. During recession there is a high unemployment rate. Even some peaks of the development like in the Total Factor Productivity, integration or infrastructure there have been recession and a bad time for the Albania too. This affected the investments, the business and by lowering their profits they are obligated to lay off employees. So the unemployment rate starts to rise up. This study takes in consideration the years from 2000 to 2013 when the unemployment was rising day by day with negative impact in the economy. This thesis introduces the general relationship between gross domestic product and unemployment. The methodology used a simple regression and takes the economic growth as dependent variable and the unemployment rate as independent. The observed result didn't explain the Okun's law for Albania. The main reason is the current crises that prevent the improvement of economic conditions.


Author(s):  
Perenparaj Nadeshan ◽  
Gnanachandran Gnanachandran

The main goal of our research is to find out a relationship between the unemployment rate and the GDP growth rate in Sri Lanka according to Okun’s law and to know whether it can still be used as the best rule of thumb. This empirical analysis has employed the difference model, dynamic model, Error Correction Model (ECM) and Vector Error Correction Model (VECM) to validate the relationship between the unemployment rate and economic growth suggested by Okun's Law. The study is based on Quarterly data from 2004 Q1 to 2019 Q4. The results obtained through the application of varies econometric techniques such as Ordinary least square (OLS), Engel-Granger approach and cointegration procedure. The study finds that, Okun’s law is supported only by the cointegration analysis as expected by the Okun’s law in Sri Lanka. However, all other versions were reported negative Okun’s law coefficient signs while these results are not statistically significant. Overall this study is not able to found enough evidence to prove the inverse relationship between unemployment rate and economic growth rate in short run and able to found that Okun’s law can still be used as the best rule of thumb to describe the relationship between the unemployment and GDP growth in long term in Sri Lanka.


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