Cash-on-hand and the Duration of Job Search: Quasi-experimental Evidence from Norway

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Basten, Christoph; Fagereng, Andreas; Telle, Kjetil
• 署名单位: Swiss Federal Institutes of Technology Domain; ETH Zurich; Statistics Norway
• 刊物名称: ECONOMIC JOURNAL
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0013-0133
• DOI: 10.1111/ecoj.12135
• 发表日期: 2014
• 页码: 540-568
• 关键词: regression discontinuity designs; disability insurance; unemployment; ECONOMICS; models

摘要

We identify the causal effect of lump-sum severance payments on non-employment duration in Norway by exploiting a discontinuity in eligibility at the age of 50. We find that a payment worth 1.2months' earnings at the median lowers the fraction re-employed after a year by about 8 percentage points. This is what we would expect if liquidity constraints force unemployed workers to accept a job offer earlier than would be optimal. As further support for the liquidity interpretation, we use data on wealth before unemployment to show that the effect of non-employment duration occurs for the non-wealthy only.