Research Discussion Papers, Bank of Finland
No 6/2004:
Unintended convergence – how Finnish unemployment reached the European level
Erkki Koskela ()
and Roope Uusitalo
Abstract: Finnish unemployment rose in the early 1990s from 3% to
18% in just four years. It has since fallen back to the average European
level, being 9.0% in January 2003. In this paper, we describe the shocks
leading to this unforeseen increase in unemployment. We then discuss and
research the role of labour market institutions in the adjustment process
that has brought unemployment back to a ‘normal’ level. We argue that these
institutions cannot be blamed for the increase in unemployment, but that
more flexible institutions could have led to a more rapid fall in
unemployment once the Finnish economy began to recover.
Keywords: economic crisis; labour market institutions; unemployment; (follow links to similar papers)
JEL-Codes: E32; J51; J64; (follow links to similar papers)
35 pages, January 1, 2004
Before downloading any of the electronic versions below
you should read our statement on
copyright.
Download GhostScript
for viewing Postscript files and the
Acrobat Reader for viewing and printing pdf files.
Full text versions of the paper:
0406.pdf 
Download Statistics
Questions (including download problems) about the papers in this series should be directed to Minna Nyman ()
Report other problems with accessing this service to Sune Karlsson ()
or Helena Lundin ().
Programing by
Design by Joachim Ekebom
