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Is Incomes Policy the Answer to Unemployment? (1982)

In: Tackling Unemployment

Author

Listed:
  • Richard Layard

    (London School of Economics and Political Science)

Abstract

In Western Europe unemployment has remained obstinately high ever since 1975. What has prevented governments from reducing it? The answer is simple. If unemployment were reduced by normal methods, inflation would rise. It follows that the only way to cut the long-run level of unemployment is to find some other way of controlling inflation. No such device will be costless. But if we could find any method that was less costly than unemployment, we ought to adopt it. Maurice Chevalier was asked in later life what he thought of old age. ‘It’s not so bad’, he replied, ‘when you consider the alternative’. That was a true economist talking, and it is also the spirit in which I shall approach the unhappy choices open to us.

Suggested Citation

  • Richard Layard, 1999. "Is Incomes Policy the Answer to Unemployment? (1982)," Palgrave Macmillan Books, in: Tackling Unemployment, chapter 18, pages 404-423, Palgrave Macmillan.
    • Handle: RePEc:pal:palchp:978-0-230-37920-6_18
    DOI: 10.1057/9780230379206_18
    as

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