Life-Cycle Equilibrium Unemployment

39 Pages Posted: 3 Nov 2008

See all articles by Arnaud Chéron

Arnaud Chéron

University of Angers - Centre d'Etudes Prospectives d'Economie Mathematique Appliquees a la Planification (CEPREMAP); Université du Maine - Groupe d' Analyse des Itineraires et Niveaux Salariaux (GAINS)

Jean-Olivier Hairault

Université Paris I Pantheon-Sorbonne; IZA Institute of Labor Economics

François Langot

Le Mans University; University of Angers - Centre d'Etudes Prospectives d'Economie Mathematique Appliquees a la Planification (CEPREMAP); Université du Maine - Groupe d' Analyse des Itineraires et Niveaux Salariaux (GAINS); IZA Institute of Labor Economics

Abstract

This paper develops a life-cycle approach to equilibrium unemployment. Workers only differ respectively to their distance from deterministic retirement. A non age-directed search equilibrium is then typically featured by increasing (decreasing) firing (hiring) rates with age and a hump-shaped age profile for employment. Because of intergenerational inefficiencies, the Hosios condition no longer achieves efficiency. We then explore the optimal age-pattern of some policy tools to restore this efficiency. The optimal profile for employment subsidies should increase with age, whereas firing taxes and hirings subsidies would have to be hump-shaped. Lastly, we examine the robustness of our results. We show that age-directed recruitment policies cannot exist in equilibrium even if it would have been ex-ante possible, and that introducing endogenous search effort of unemployed workers reinforces our main results.

Keywords: job search, matching, life cycle

JEL Classification: J22, J26, H55

Suggested Citation

Cheron, Arnaud and Hairault, Jean-Olivier and Langot, Francois, Life-Cycle Equilibrium Unemployment. IZA Discussion Paper No. 3396, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=1294539 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.1294539

Arnaud Cheron (Contact Author)

University of Angers - Centre d'Etudes Prospectives d'Economie Mathematique Appliquees a la Planification (CEPREMAP) ( email )

Ecole Normale Superieure
48 boulevard Jourdan
75014 Paris
France

Université du Maine - Groupe d' Analyse des Itineraires et Niveaux Salariaux (GAINS)

72085 Le Mans Cedex 9
France

Jean-Olivier Hairault

Université Paris I Pantheon-Sorbonne ( email )

12, place du Panthéon
Paris, IL
France

IZA Institute of Labor Economics

P.O. Box 7240
Bonn, D-53072
Germany

Francois Langot

Le Mans University ( email )

University of Angers - Centre d'Etudes Prospectives d'Economie Mathematique Appliquees a la Planification (CEPREMAP) ( email )

Ecole Normale Superieure
48 boulevard Jourdan
75014 Paris
France

Université du Maine - Groupe d' Analyse des Itineraires et Niveaux Salariaux (GAINS) ( email )

72085 Le Mans Cedex 9
France

IZA Institute of Labor Economics

P.O. Box 7240
Bonn, D-53072
Germany

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