Counselling and Monitoring of Unemployed Workers: Theory and Evidence from a Controlled Social Experiment

Abstract:     
We investigate the effect of counselling and monitoring on the individual employment transition rate. We theoretically analyze these policies in a job search model with two search channels and endogenous search effort. In the empirical analysis we use unique administrative and survey data concerning a social experiment with full randomization and compliance. The results show that counselling and monitoring do not affect the work exit rate. Monitoring causes a shift from informal to formal job searching. We combine our empirical results with the results from our theoretical analysis and the existing empirical literature to establish a comprehensive analysis of the effectiveness of these policies.
randomized social experiment

Number of Pages in PDF File: 57

Keywords: Unemployment duration, search effort, active labor market policy, treatment, search channels, multi-tasking,

JEL Classification: J58, J64, J65

working papers series