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Wage employment, unemployment and self-employment across countries

Author

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  • Poschke, Markus

Abstract

Poor countries have low wage employment and high self-employment. This paper shows that they also have high unemployment relative to wage employment, and that self-employment increases with this ratio. To understand the sources of these patterns, I build a search and matching model with choice between job search and self-employment and with learning about matches, and calibrate it to match all transition rates between wage employment, unemployment and self-employment as well as separation hazards by job duration, separately for all 37 countries with available data. Quantitative analysis of the model shows that labor market frictions affect self-employment as much as unemployment. Labor market frictions also reduce aggregate output, not only by raising unemployment, but also by worsening the average quality of both wage employment matches and active self-employment projects.

Suggested Citation

  • Poschke, Markus, 2025. "Wage employment, unemployment and self-employment across countries," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 149(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:moneco:v:149:y:2025:i:c:s0304393224001375
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jmoneco.2024.103684
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Wage employment; Unemployment; Self-employment; Labor market frictions; Occupational choice; Productivity;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • O11 - Economic Development, Innovation, Technological Change, and Growth - - Economic Development - - - Macroeconomic Analyses of Economic Development
    • E24 - Macroeconomics and Monetary Economics - - Consumption, Saving, Production, Employment, and Investment - - - Employment; Unemployment; Wages; Intergenerational Income Distribution; Aggregate Human Capital; Aggregate Labor Productivity
    • J64 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Mobility, Unemployment, Vacancies, and Immigrant Workers - - - Unemployment: Models, Duration, Incidence, and Job Search
    • L26 - Industrial Organization - - Firm Objectives, Organization, and Behavior - - - Entrepreneurship

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