OECD Social, Employment and Migration Working Papers
This series is designed to make available to a wider readership selected labour market, social policy and migration studies prepared for use within the OECD. Authorship is usually collective, but principal writers are named. The papers are generally available only in their original language - English or French - with a summary in the other.
- ISSN: 1815199X (online)
- https://doi.org/10.1787/1815199X
Lost and found?
The cost of job loss in France
Combining the longitudinal dimension and the retrospective calendar of the French Labour Force Survey (2003-2011), we analyse the labour market transitions and outcomes of workers who were dismissed for economic reasons. This study analyses the re-employment patterns of displaced workers and their earnings losses, as is common in the literature, as well as the consequences of displacement for other aspects of job quality. Results suggest that the cost of involuntary job loss is important and goes beyond the fall in earnings. Workers who are made redundant face relatively long spells of non-employment before getting back to work and their new jobs tend to be of lower quality than their pre-displacement jobs along a number dimensions. Re-employed displaced workers suffer a monthly wage penalty of 15-20% and are, on average, nine times as likely to lose their job again as are workers who have not been made redundant. In addition, displaced workers are more likely to work part-time once re-employed, and to have fewer paid holidays and lower job authority than had they not been dismissed, though these differences tend to fall over time.
Keywords: Unemployment duration, displaced, layoffs, job search, dismissed
JEL:
J68: Labor and Demographic Economics / Mobility, Unemployment, Vacancies, and Immigrant Workers / Mobility, Unemployment, and Vacancies: Public Policy;
J65: Labor and Demographic Economics / Mobility, Unemployment, Vacancies, and Immigrant Workers / Unemployment Insurance; Severance Pay; Plant Closings;
J64: Labor and Demographic Economics / Mobility, Unemployment, Vacancies, and Immigrant Workers / Unemployment: Models, Duration, Incidence, and Job Search;
J63: Labor and Demographic Economics / Mobility, Unemployment, Vacancies, and Immigrant Workers / Labor Turnover; Vacancies; Layoffs
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