Finding an explanation for the rise and persistence of European unemployment has been one of the main research programmes of labour economists during the last decade. In this doctoral thesis, we contribute to this literature by questioning the causes of unemployment persistence in Belgium. To that purpose, we conduct an in-depth econometric analysis of the flows out of unemployment in this country. In Chapters 2 and 3, we study the behaviour of the exit rate out of unemployment over duration and calendar time. In Chapter 3, we investigate whether this behaviour differs according to the place of living and the skill level, as measured by the level of education. Finally, in Chapter 4, we determine to what extent the divergences in the rate of flowing from unemployment between workers with different levels of education can be explained by a skill mismatch phenomenon and/or by a job competition story. By refining the causes of unemployment persistence in Belgium, our doctoral research also contributes to the design of more effective labour market policies.

Finding an explanation for the rise and persistence of European unemployment has been one of the main research programmes of labour economists during the last decade. In this doctoral thesis, we contribute to this literature by questioning the causes of unemployment persistence in Belgium. To that purpose, we conduct an in-depth econometric analysis of the flows out of unemployment in this country. In Chapters 2 and 3, we study the behaviour of the exit rate out of unemployment over duration and calendar time. In Chapter 3, we investigate whether this behaviour differs according to the place of living and the skill level, as measured by the level of education. Finally, in Chapter 4, we determine to what extent the divergences in the rate of flowing from unemployment between workers with different levels of education can be explained by a skill mismatch phenomenon and/or by a job competition story. By refining the causes of unemployment persistence in Belgium, our doctoral research also contributes to the design of more effective labour market policies.

The main objective of this bachelor thesis is to analyse the dynamic and complex decision-making process that households with temporary overseas migrating family members do before migrating. The aim of this thesis is to understand why this phenomenon occurs in less developed areas, though the background of the thesis is trying to address the need of positive relationship between migration and development. Based on the theorectical benchmark of neoclassical microeconomic theory and new economics of labour migration theory certain factors were identified that could influence the decision to migrate. By using a mixed method with qualitative semi-structed face-to-face interviews combined with a survey of nine question relating to specific factors this study was able to create an understanding of the reality of migrant households, though a micro field study was conducted in Kebumen regency in Indonesia. The findings clearly shows that temporary overseas migration from less developed areas is a household decision that is influenced by local gender aspects and addressed by new well-functioning established markets for overseas work. Our findings also suggests that temporary migration is a way for the family to spread their risks, related to income and farming activites, and to achive further development, where other markets and institutions do not meet their needs. Policies regarding these gender aspects and the need of institutions that could improve the situation are recommended though remittances in that case might have a more long-term sustainable impact on the households.

Chapter 1 Low-skilled Migration and Altruism: Population ageing has become a common concern among welfare states, including Canada and most of the OECD countries. Immigration has been identified as a solution to help sustain labour-force growth in industrialized countries, and as the factor most able to mitigate dire predictions of future fiscal imbalances. This chapter examines the impact of low-skilled immigration in a host country where households are altruists with a pay-as-you-go pension system to support the elderly. It demonstrates that low-skilled immigration does not harm the welfare of the domestic population. We use an overlapping-generations model similar to the work of Razin and Sadka (2000) but introduce paternalistic altruism into the life-cycle framework. Within this context of inter-generational altruism and pay-as-you-go pension systems, the initial negative fiscal impact of low-skilled migrants is compensated, thus, all income groups (high and low) and all age groups (young and old) benefit from migration. // Chapter 2 Growth and Sustainability: In light of the major environmental issues experienced by several countries in the last decades, several papers have advocated the rethinking of the role of governments in environmental preservation. This chapter develops an overlapping-generations model of environmental quality and production and investigates the potential role of governmental participation in the preservation of the quality of the environment so as to achieve both economic growth and environmental sustainability. The analysis suggests that long term economic growth and environment sustainability can be maintained with tax-funded environmental programs in a context of a negative production externality on the quality of the environment. // Chapter 3 The Incidence of Geography on Canada’s Services Trade: We estimate geographic barriers to export trade in nine service categories for Canada's provinces from 1997 to 2007 using the structural gravity model. Constructed Home, Domestic and Foreign Bias indexes capture the direct plus indirect effect of services trade costs on intra-provincial, inter-provincial and international trade relative to their frictionless benchmarks. Barriers to services international trade are huge relative to inter-provincial trade and large relative to goods international trade. A novel test confirms the fit of structural gravity with services trade data.

Chapter 1 Low-skilled Migration and Altruism: Population ageing has become a common concern among welfare states, including Canada and most of the OECD countries. Immigration has been identified as a solution to help sustain labour-force growth in industrialized countries, and as the factor most able to mitigate dire predictions of future fiscal imbalances. This chapter examines the impact of low-skilled immigration in a host country where households are altruists with a pay-as-you-go pension system to support the elderly. It demonstrates that low-skilled immigration does not harm the welfare of the domestic population. We use an overlapping-generations model similar to the work of Razin and Sadka (2000) but introduce paternalistic altruism into the life-cycle framework. Within this context of inter-generational altruism and pay-as-you-go pension systems, the initial negative fiscal impact of low-skilled migrants is compensated, thus, all income groups (high and low) and all age groups (young and old) benefit from migration. // Chapter 2 Growth and Sustainability: In light of the major environmental issues experienced by several countries in the last decades, several papers have advocated the rethinking of the role of governments in environmental preservation. This chapter develops an overlapping-generations model of environmental quality and production and investigates the potential role of governmental participation in the preservation of the quality of the environment so as to achieve both economic growth and environmental sustainability. The analysis suggests that long term economic growth and environment sustainability can be maintained with tax-funded environmental programs in a context of a negative production externality on the quality of the environment. // Chapter 3 The Incidence of Geography on Canada’s Services Trade: We estimate geographic barriers to export trade in nine service categories for Canada's provinces from 1997 to 2007 using the structural gravity model. Constructed Home, Domestic and Foreign Bias indexes capture the direct plus indirect effect of services trade costs on intra-provincial, inter-provincial and international trade relative to their frictionless benchmarks. Barriers to services international trade are huge relative to inter-provincial trade and large relative to goods international trade. A novel test confirms the fit of structural gravity with services trade data.

Chapter 1 Low-skilled Migration and Altruism: Population ageing has become a common concern among welfare states, including Canada and most of the OECD countries. Immigration has been identified as a solution to help sustain labour-force growth in industrialized countries, and as the factor most able to mitigate dire predictions of future fiscal imbalances. This chapter examines the impact of low-skilled immigration in a host country where households are altruists with a pay-as-you-go pension system to support the elderly. It demonstrates that low-skilled immigration does not harm the welfare of the domestic population. We use an overlapping-generations model similar to the work of Razin and Sadka (2000) but introduce paternalistic altruism into the life-cycle framework. Within this context of inter-generational altruism and pay-as-you-go pension systems, the initial negative fiscal impact of low-skilled migrants is compensated, thus, all income groups (high and low) and all age groups (young and old) benefit from migration. // Chapter 2 Growth and Sustainability: In light of the major environmental issues experienced by several countries in the last decades, several papers have advocated the rethinking of the role of governments in environmental preservation. This chapter develops an overlapping-generations model of environmental quality and production and investigates the potential role of governmental participation in the preservation of the quality of the environment so as to achieve both economic growth and environmental sustainability. The analysis suggests that long term economic growth and environment sustainability can be maintained with tax-funded environmental programs in a context of a negative production externality on the quality of the environment. // Chapter 3 The Incidence of Geography on Canada’s Services Trade: We estimate geographic barriers to export trade in nine service categories for Canada's provinces from 1997 to 2007 using the structural gravity model. Constructed Home, Domestic and Foreign Bias indexes capture the direct plus indirect effect of services trade costs on intra-provincial, inter-provincial and international trade relative to their frictionless benchmarks. Barriers to services international trade are huge relative to inter-provincial trade and large relative to goods international trade. A novel test confirms the fit of structural gravity with services trade data.

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The aim of our study is to investigate the effect of immigrants on wages for natives with divergent skill level within one country. Skill level is measured as education level and the purpose is to focus on the level where it according to us is a lack in research, namely the effect on high skilled native-born worker wages. Further, our contribution to the already existing studies may be considered to be a complement. Using panel data, collected from the time period 2000-2008 for the 290 municipalities in Sweden to get regional variation, we investigate and interpret the estimated outcome of how wages for native-born workers in the Swedish labor market respond to immigration into Sweden. The main findings, when controlling for age, unemployment, and differences between year and municipalities in this study are on the short run, in line with the theory. The closer to a substitute the native-born and foreign-born workers are, the greater are the adverse effect on the wage for native-born, given that we assume immigrants as low skilled. The effect on wage for high skilled native workers in short run, when assuming immigrants and natives as complement, is positive, i.e. the wage for high skilled natives increases as the share of immigrants increases. The effect on high skilled native-born wages is positive even in mid-long run and adverse for the low and medium skilled native-workers. This is not an expected outcome since we according to theory predict the wage to be unaffected in mid-long run. This may be the result of errors in the assumption that immigrants are low skilled, or that five years is a too short time to see the expected effect in the long run; the Swedish labor market may need more time to adjust to what we predict the outcome to be.

This paper investigates in what way employment for low-skilled workers is connected to the wage dispersion in a country by comparing Sweden to six European countries. Previous research on this topic used cross-section analysis, but this essay takes another approach by comparing the changes in the wage dispersion and employment and by breaking down the change in the wage dispersion into parts and studying the change in the wage for different percentiles. The paper finds that wages in Sweden have not converged, which likely contributed to the increase in the employment gap between people with high and low skills. Two countries with different development were Germany and Norway. In line with recent research, in Germany, wage inequality increased and the employment gap between people with high and low skills decreased. In comparison, the case of Norway has not received much attention among researchers. Wages converged more in Norway than in Germany, yet employment increased more in Germany. The paper suggests a potential explanation: wages for the bottom percentiles of the earnings distribution fell in Germany, which it did not in Norway.

The purpose of this thesis is to analyze the process of internal migration in Peoples' Republic of China. It focuses on low-skilled rural migrant workers, their overall characteristics, role in the economy and their status within Chinese society. This analysis aims to prove that despite the fact that rural migrants represent an essential element of Chinese economy, and have contributed by a great deal to China's economic take-off, they are still a very discriminated group of Chinese society and are constantly facing violations of their rights.