MEASURING THE DURATION OF UNEMPLOYMENT: A NOTE
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9485.1983.tb01011.x |
| Published date | 01 June 1983 |
| Author | Anders Björklund |
| Date | 01 June 1983 |
Scoirish
Journal
of
Polirical
Economy.
Vol
30.
No
2,
June
1983
0
1983
Scottish Economic Society
MEASURING THE DURATION
OF
UNEMPLOYMENT
:
A
NOTE
ANDERS
BJORKLUND
The Industrial Institute
for
Economic and Social Research,
Stockholm
I
INTRODUCTION
Ever since the early seventies, when labour economists became interested in
“unemployment dynamics”, a lot has been written about pure measurement
problems in this field. The background to this literature is, briefly, the
following
:
the only easily available unemployment duration statistic
at
the
beginning of the seventies was the duration of uncompleted spells, i.e. the time
the unemployed had been unemployed until the time
of
the survey.
Most researchers found this statistic insufficient, and sometimes even
irrelevant. Therefore
a
lot of work has been devoted to get data and
measurement methods which provide statistics especially on the duration of
the completed spells for those who become unemployed. In many countries the
Bureaux responsible for unemployment statistics have made significant efforts
to produce and publish the more detailed data that were needed
for
these
purposes.
Recently Akerlof and Main’ and Clark and Summers2 have suggested
additional statistics which highlight the
total
unemployment experiences for
those currently unemployed. In particular Akerlof and Main suggest an
“experience-weighted measure of unemployment duration”, which is the
average time those now unemployed will be unemployed until they eventually
get a job
(or
leave the labour force).
In
a
note in this Journal, written as a response to Main, Layard3 advocates
the “traditional statistic”, the duration of uncompleted spells, available
already in the early seventies both
for
positive and normative purposes.
‘G. Akerlof and
B.
Main, An Experience-Weighted Measure
of
Employment and
Unemployment Durations,
American Economic
Review,
December 198
1
and
B.
Main, The Length
of
Employment and Unemployment in Great Britain,
Scottish Journal ojPolitical Economy,
June
1981.
*
K.
Clark and L. Summers, Labor Market Dynamics and Unemployment: A Recon-
sideration, Brookings Papers, Washington 1979,
1.
’
R.
Layard, Measuring the Duration
of
Unemployment
:
A Note,
Scottish Journal ojPolitical
Economy.
November 1981.
Date
of
receipt
of
final manuscript: 19 October 1982.
175
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