Declining Search Frictions, Unemployment and Self-Employment

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Denderski, Piotr; Sniekers, Florian
• 署名单位: University of Leicester; University of Leicester; Polish Academy of Sciences; Institute of Economics of the Polish Academy of Sciences; Tilburg University
• 刊物名称: ECONOMIC JOURNAL
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0013-0133
• DOI: 10.1093/ej/uead093
• 发表日期: 2024
• 页码: 1100-1145
• 关键词: broad-band; equilibrium; internet; POLICY; rates

摘要

In most OECD countries, unemployment rates show no trend, which is puzzling if advancements in information and communication technologies decrease labour-market frictions. We show, both analytically and quantitatively, that accounting for the secular decline in self-employment rates solves the puzzle. While declining labour-market frictions can theoretically explain these trends, we provide contradictory causal evidence that the roll-out of broadband internet has increased self-employment and decreased unemployment rates. We reconcile these observations with a new model featuring frictions in both labour and goods markets. We explain falling self-employment and non-trending unemployment quantitatively by labour-market frictions declining relatively more than goods-market frictions.