IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/erg/wpaper/881.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Job Accession, Separation and Mobility in the Egyptian Labor Market Over the Past Decade

Author

Listed:
  • Shaimaa Yassin

    (University of Paris1 Pantheon-Sorbonne (CES))

Abstract

The aim of this paper is to assess to what extent is the Egyptian labor market dynamic and the impact of its dynamics on stagnant unemployment rates. By estimating annual and semiannual transition probabilities of workers among different employment sectors as well as between employment and non-employment states, the paper explores how sluggish the Egyptian labor market has been throughout the past decade, and characterizes the subcategories which suffer the most from this rigidity. In the absence of official and research statistics of these transitions in Egypt, these estimates would surely improve the monitoring of business cycles, the detection of inflection (turning) points and the assessment of labor market tightness. A unique semi-annual panel of labor market micro-data, generated from the new cross-sectional Egypt Labor Market Panel Survey 2012, is used in the analysis. Results show evidence of relatively rigid dynamics within the Egyptian labor market with a turning point in trends of job accession (job finding) and separation rates right after the financial crisis and the January 2011 uprising. Flows into and out of unemployment seem to have been affected by the slowdown of the economic growth following the Arab Spring during which separation rates almost doubled and job finding rates declined. Even after an increase in the separation rates of about one percentage point, these rates remain very low, reflecting an extremely rigid labor market. In such times of crises, unemployment rises not only because workers lose their jobs into non-employment (evidence of increasing involuntary job exits), but also because it becomes harder to find jobs, which is verified by a substantial decline in the job finding rate after 2009. Results also suggest that claims of increasing job losses after January 2011 uprising were exaggerated. Additionally, a rise in job-to-job transitions, especially among informal workers, is observed

Suggested Citation

  • Shaimaa Yassin, 2014. "Job Accession, Separation and Mobility in the Egyptian Labor Market Over the Past Decade," Working Papers 881, Economic Research Forum, revised Nov 2014.
    • Handle: RePEc:erg:wpaper:881
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://erf.org.eg/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/881.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: http://bit.ly/2mLa2ck
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Gomes, Pedro, 2012. "Labour market flows: Facts from the United Kingdom," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 19(2), pages 165-175.
    2. Javier Herrera & Gerardo David Rosas Shady, 2003. "Labor Market Transitions in Peru," Working Papers DT/2003/14, DIAL (Développement, Institutions et Mondialisation).
    3. Shigeru Fujita & Garey Ramey, 2009. "The Cyclicality Of Separation And Job Finding Rates," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 50(2), pages 415-430, May.
    4. Hairault, Jean-Olivier & Le Barbanchon, Thomas & Sopraseuth, Thepthida, 2015. "The cyclicality of the separation and job finding rates in France," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 76(C), pages 60-84.
    5. Ragui Assaad & Caroline Krafft, 2013. "The Egypt labor market panel survey: introducing the 2012 round," IZA Journal of Labor & Development, Springer;Forschungsinstitut zur Zukunft der Arbeit GmbH (IZA), vol. 2(1), pages 1-30, December.
    6. Robert Shimer, 2012. "Reassessing the Ins and Outs of Unemployment," Review of Economic Dynamics, Elsevier for the Society for Economic Dynamics, vol. 15(2), pages 127-148, April.
    7. Hoyt Bleakley & Ann E. Ferris & Jeffrey C. Fuhrer, 1999. "New data on worker flows during business cycles," New England Economic Review, Federal Reserve Bank of Boston, issue Jul, pages 49-76.
    8. Shaimaa Yassin, 2013. "Structural Labor Market Transitions and Wage Dispersion in Egypt and Jordan," Working Papers 753, Economic Research Forum, revised May 2013.
    9. repec:dau:papers:123456789/4515 is not listed on IDEAS
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Ragui Assaad & Caroline Krafft, 2023. "Labour market dynamics and youth unemployment in the Middle East and North Africa: Evidence from Egypt, Jordan, and Tunisia," LABOUR, CEIS, vol. 37(4), pages 519-553, December.
    2. Caroline Krafft & Ragui Assaad, 2020. "Employment’s Role in Enabling and Constraining Marriage in the Middle East and North Africa," Demography, Springer;Population Association of America (PAA), vol. 57(6), pages 2297-2325, December.
    3. Ragui Assaad & Rana Hendy & Moundir Lassassi & Shaimaa Yassin, 2020. "Explaining the MENA paradox: Rising educational attainment yet stagnant female labor force participation," Demographic Research, Max Planck Institute for Demographic Research, Rostock, Germany, vol. 43(28), pages 817-850.
    4. Ahmed Elsayed & Jackline Wahba, 2019. "Political change and informality : Evidence from the Arab Spring," The Economics of Transition, The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, vol. 27(1), pages 31-66, January.
    5. Ragui Assaad & Caroline Krafft & Colette Salemi, 2023. "Socioeconomic Status and the Changing Nature of School-to-Work Transitions in Egypt, Jordan, and Tunisia," ILR Review, Cornell University, ILR School, vol. 76(4), pages 697-723, August.
    6. Ragui Assaad & Caroline Krafft & Shaimaa Yassin, 2020. "Job creation or labor absorption? An analysis of private sector job growth in Egypt," Middle East Development Journal, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 12(2), pages 177-207, July.
    7. Caroline Krafft, 2020. "Why is fertility on the rise in Egypt? The role of women’s employment opportunities," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 33(4), pages 1173-1218, October.
    8. Shaimaa Yassin, 2016. "Constructing Labor Market Transitions Recall Weights in Retrospective Data: An Application to Egypt and Jordan," Working Papers 1061, Economic Research Forum, revised 11 Jan 2016.
    9. World Bank, 2014. "More Jobs, Better Jobs : A Priority for Egypt," World Bank Publications - Reports 20584, The World Bank Group.
    10. Caroline Krafft, 2016. "Understanding the Dynamics of Household Enterprises in Egypt: Birth, Death, Growth and Transformation," Working Papers 983, Economic Research Forum, revised Mar 2016.
    11. Mona Amer, 2014. "Patterns of Labor Market Insertion in Egypt, 1998-2012," Working Papers 849, Economic Research Forum, revised Oct 2014.
    12. Caroline Krafft & Ragui Assaad, 2018. "Do More Productive Firms Pay Workers More? Evidence from Egypt," Working Papers 1222, Economic Research Forum, revised 18 Sep 2018.
    13. Shaimaa Yassin & Francois Langot, 2017. "Correcting Measurement Errors in Transition Models Based on Retrospective Panel Data," IRENE Working Papers 17-04, IRENE Institute of Economic Research.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Matthias S. Hertweck & Oliver Sigrist, 2012. "The Aggregate Effects of the Hartz Reforms in Germany," Working Paper Series of the Department of Economics, University of Konstanz 2012-38, Department of Economics, University of Konstanz.
    2. Lin, Ching-Yang & Miyamoto, Hiroaki, 2012. "Gross worker flows and unemployment dynamics in Japan," Journal of the Japanese and International Economies, Elsevier, vol. 26(1), pages 44-61.
    3. Fontaine, Idriss & Gálvez-Iniesta, Ismael & Gomes, Pedro & Vila-Martin, Diego, 2020. "Labour market flows: Accounting for the public sector," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 62(C).
    4. Ronald Bachmann & Peggy Bechara & Anica Kramer & Sylvi Rzepka, 2015. "Labour market dynamics and worker heterogeneity during the Great Recession – Evidence from Europe," IZA Journal of European Labor Studies, Springer;Forschungsinstitut zur Zukunft der Arbeit GmbH (IZA), vol. 4(1), pages 1-29, December.
    5. Pedro Gomes, 2015. "The importance of frequency in estimating labour market transition rates," IZA Journal of Labor Economics, Springer;Forschungsinstitut zur Zukunft der Arbeit GmbH (IZA), vol. 4(1), pages 1-10, December.
    6. Elsby, Michael W.L. & Hobijn, Bart & Şahin, Ayşegül, 2015. "On the importance of the participation margin for labor market fluctuations," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 72(C), pages 64-82.
    7. Shigeru Fujita, 2011. "Dynamics of worker flows and vacancies: evidence from the sign restriction approach," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 26(1), pages 89-121, January/F.
    8. Robert Dixon & G. C. Lim & Jan C. van Ours, 2015. "The effect of shocks to labour market flows on unemployment and participation rates," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 47(24), pages 2523-2539, May.
    9. Y. Saks, 2016. "Socio-economic transitions on the labour market : a European benchmarking exercise," Economic Review, National Bank of Belgium, issue iii, pages 41-58, December.
    10. Portugal, Pedro & Rua, António, 2018. "Zooming the Ins and Outs of the U.S. Unemployment with a Wavelet Lens," IZA Discussion Papers 11559, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    11. Gomes, Pedro, 2012. "Labour market flows: Facts from the United Kingdom," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 19(2), pages 165-175.
    12. Silva, José I. & Vázquez-Grenno, Javier, 2013. "The ins and outs of unemployment in a two-tier labor market," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 24(C), pages 161-169.
    13. Jed Armstrong & Özer Karagedikli, 2017. "The role of non-participants in labour market dynamics," Reserve Bank of New Zealand Analytical Notes series AN2017/01, Reserve Bank of New Zealand.
    14. Viviana Alejandra Alfonso C., 2015. "The cyclical behavior of separation and job finding rates in Colombia," Borradores de Economia 13885, Banco de la Republica.
    15. Andreas I. Mueller, 2017. "Separations, Sorting, and Cyclical Unemployment," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 107(7), pages 2081-2107, July.
    16. Fernando Martins & Domingos Seward, 2019. "Into the heterogeneities in the Portuguese labour market: an empirical assessment," Working Papers w201908, Banco de Portugal, Economics and Research Department.
    17. Razzu, Giovanni & Singleton, Carl, 2016. "Gender and the business cycle: An analysis of labour markets in the US and UK," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 47(PB), pages 131-146.
    18. Hairault, Jean-Olivier & Zhutova, Anastasia, 2018. "The cyclicality of labor-market flows: A multiple-shock approach," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 103(C), pages 150-172.
    19. Barnichon, Regis, 2012. "Vacancy posting, job separation and unemployment fluctuations," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 36(3), pages 315-330.
    20. Carolina Fugazza, 2018. "Anatomy of Unemployment Risk," Working papers 048, Department of Economics, Social Studies, Applied Mathematics and Statistics (Dipartimento di Scienze Economico-Sociali e Matematico-Statistiche), University of Torino.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:erg:wpaper:881. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sherine Ghoneim (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/erfaceg.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.