THE EFFECT OF GEOGRAPHICAL POSITION AND EMPLOYMENT FLUCTUATIONS ON RURAL SETTLEMENT TRENDS

Structural changes in the economy and spatial and inter-settlement differences in living standards and quality of life lead to fundamental alterations in the national settlement system. Settlement polarisation is gathering momentum, along with the movement of rural population from Russia’s east and north to its southern and metropolitan regions. These processes benefit urban agglomerations. Typological differences between regional settlement systems, still poorly understood but essential for strategic and spatial planning, are growing. This article draws on the concept of the geographical demographic situation; it uses official statistics on Russian regions and Kaliningrad municipalities and settlements to explore the connection between rural settlement trends and employment fluctuations caused by structural shifts in Russian regional economies. It is shown how settlement polarisation affects differences in settlement trends of meso- and microdistrict levels. Regions are identified that have a capacity for rural-urban migration and corresponding rural employment structure and trends.

Tax Cuts and Fee Reductions and Labor Demand of SMEs

<p>Policies to cut taxes and fees are important means to deal with the economic downturn, which strongly support to the development of the majority of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). The current study has no consistent conclusion of whether SMEs expand their labor demand because of this. This paper builds a structural vector autoregressive (VAR) model to analyze the dynamic effects of tax cuts and fee reduction policies on increasing labor demand for SMEs. The empirical results show that tax cuts and fee reductions are important causes of short-term employment fluctuations, but in the long run, it is difficult for taxation policies to have a direct positive effect on employment. Therefore, this article puts forward the idea that different tax incentives can be formulated for small and medium-sized enterprises in the short term according to their life cycles. In the long run, the focus of macro-control needs to be turned to supply management to achieve the goal of stable employment.</p>

Labour Market Institutions and Amplification of Employment Fluctuations

Labour market reforms have been undertaken to eliminate labour market rigidities in European countries since 1970s. The important features of the reforms are the reduction in adjustment costs and the introduction of fixed-term contracts (FTC). Some empirical studies point out that employment fluctuations have become more volatile after the reforms. This paper presents a model with FTC and analyzes the effects of the key features of the reforms. Numerical examples show that an expected productivity shock causes the oscillatory behaviour of employment. Moreover, a reduction in adjustment costs amplifies fluctuations. In the labour market literature, a number of studies point out the importance of trade unions in European countries. This paper also analyzes the effects of union influence, and the numerical examples indicate that the stronger union influence leads to larger employment fluctuations.

The Growth Potential of Startups over the Business Cycle

This paper shows that employment in cohorts of US firms is strongly influenced by aggregate conditions at the time of their entry. Employment fluctuations of startups are procyclical, they persist into later years, and cohort-level employment variations are largely driven by differences in firm size, rather than the number of firms. An estimated general equilibrium firm dynamics model reveals that aggregate conditions at birth, rather than post-entry choices, drive the majority of cohort-level employment variation by affecting the share of startups with high growth potential. In the aggregate, changes in startup conditions result in large, slow-moving fluctuations in employment. (JEL D25, E24, E32, J23, L25, M13)

Jobless Recovery and Structural Change: A VAR Approach

This study uses a vector autoregression approach to examine the link between jobless recoveries and the fast employment expansion in finance, health and education (FHE) sectors. Both reduced-form estimates and impulse responses indicate a negative effect of the expansion on aggregate employment. While the expansion Granger causes aggregate employment fluctuations, up to 40 per cent of the error variance of those fluctuations can be explained by innovations in the expansion. Moreover, movements in aggregate employment are reduced by 25 per cent when the expansion is accounted for. Therefore, the fast expansion of the FHE sectors is shown to have notably contributed to the onset of jobless recoveries. JEL Classification: E24, E32, C32