Econometric Evaluation of Labour Market Policies

Empirical measurement of impacts of active labour market programmes has started to become a central task of economic researchers. New improved econometric methods have been developed that will probably influence future empirical work in various other fields of economics as well. This volume contains a selection of original papers from leading experts, among them James J. Heckman, Noble Prize Winner 2000 in economics, addressing these econometric issues at the theoretical and empirical level. The theoretical part contains papers on tight bounds of average treatment effects, instrumental variables estimators, impact measurement with multiple programme options and statistical profiling. The empirical part provides the reader with econometric evaluations of active labour market programmes in Canada, Germany, France, Italy, Slovak Republic and Sweden.

Instrumental variables, selection models, and tight bounds on the average treatment effect. - Some remarks on instrumental variables. - Identification and estimation of causal effects of multiple treatments under the conditional independence assumption. - Evaluating profiling as a means of allocating government services. - Using matching estimators to evaluate alternative youth employment programs: Evidence from France, 1986 1988. - Do active labor market policies help unemployed workers to find and keep regular jobs? . - Why do subsidised firms survive longer? An evaluation of a program promoting youth entrepreneurship in Italy. - Estimating the effects of vocational rehabilitation programs in Sweden. - The impact of non-profit temping agencies on individual labour market success.