Skill, Sorting and Cyclical Unemployment: Evidence from Sweden
Publication Date
1-1-2013
Grant Type
Early Career Research Award
Description
This research will determine the extent to which the skill composition of the pool of unemployed changes over the business cycle, using Swedish unemployment insurance (UI) register data matched with test score data from military enlistment. The focus of the project will be on a fine measure of cognitive and non-cognitive skills that are typically not available in data sets used to analyze the cyclicality of the effects of unemployment insurance or labor market programs. The main goal of the project is to characterize the distribution of these skills among the unemployed and, particularly, to determine how the distribution of skills among the unemployed changes with the business cycle. Based on previous research with wage data, we expect that the pool of unemployed shifts towards high skilled individuals in recessions.