IRES also works on diagnosing the functioning of labor markets, and analyzing the impacts and the design of labor market institutions and of active labor-market policies. In addition we study social and development policies, labor income taxation and social security contributions, the aging problem, social enterprises, non-profit organizations and public policies related to them, and human capital economics.
Research in labor economics, on social policies and evaluation is organized around seven areas:
I. Unemployment
Our team is involved in several projects related to the understanding of the causes of unemployment and the effects of interventions to reduce it. A first topic of research supervised by Bruno Van der Linden is on introducing the role of labor market frictions in some standard dynamic models of urban and regional economics. Another research, led by Muriel Dejemeppe and Bruno Van der Linden, focuses on the causes of unemployment disparities within Belgium and the impacts of possible public interventions.
A third research topic relates on the analysis of monitoring and sanction schemes that are nowadays widespread in unemployment insurance (Muriel Dejemeppe and Bruno Van der Linden). Another project focuses on employment policies targeting older workers (Muriel Dejemeppe and Bruno Van der Linden).
Finally, a last topic in the broad area of labor market participation is investigating the effects of interventions supporting self-employment in disadvantaged areas of France (William Parienté).
Main publications in 2015-2016
Dejemeppe, Muriel; Van der Linden, Bruno. Réduire le coût du travail. Oui maiscomment ?. In: Dynamiques régionales, no. 3, p. 15-28 (Février 2016).
Van der Linden, Bruno. Do in-work benefits work for low-skilled workers?. In: IZA World of Labor, no. 246, p. 1-10 (March 2016).
Lehmann, Etienne; Montero Ledezma, Paola Liliana; Van der Linden, Bruno. Workforce location and equilibrium unemployment in a duocentric economy with matching frictions. In: Journal of Urban Economics, Vol. 91, p. 26-44 (January 2016).
Lehmann, Etienne; Lucifora, Claudio; Moriconi, Simone; Van der Linden, Bruno. Beyond the labour income tax wedge: the unemployment-reducing effect of tax progressivity. In: International Tax and Public Finance, Vol. 23, no. 3, p. 454-489 (June 2016).
II Designing labor income taxation
The objective of this research led by Bruno Van der Linden is to analyze the optimal income tax scheme with endogenous participation and search unemployment. The research team studies optimal redistributive taxation when individuals are heterogeneous in their skills and the value they attach to non-market activities. A related topic is optimal marginal tax rates with both extensive and intensive labor supply responses. Finally another research uses empirical tools and panel data to revisit the links between payroll taxation and the level of unemployment.
III Firm level evaluation of labor market issues
This research theme involves several researches on labor market issues analyzed at the firm level. In four different projects Vincent Vandenberghe investigates (i) the barriers to employment faced by older/female individuals using firm-level data on productivity, labor costs and (gross) profits ; (ii) the empirical measurement of gender wage discrimination using firm-level direct measures of gender productivity and wage differentials ; (iii) the analysis of the productivity gains/losses of resorting to part-time vs. full-time work assignment ; (iv) the relationship between the changing labor forces characteristics and the TFP growth slowdown.
Another project (led by William Parienté) analyzes the effect of manager discrimination on the performance of employees in a specific firm environment and tests whereas discrimination can be a self-fulfilling mechanism.
Main publications in 2015-2016
Vandenberghe, V. Is Workforce Diversity Good for Efficiency. An Approach Based on the Degree of Concavity of the Technology, In: International Journal of Manpower: an interdisciplinary journal on human resources, management & labour economics, Vol. 37, no. 2, p. 253-267 (2016).
IV. Economics of education
Our team, led by Vincent Vandenberghe, explores the relationship between human capital, productivity and wage formation. The research aims at providing estimates of the causal effect of education on productivity.
V. non-profit organizations and public policies
Four projects in the area of non-profit organizations and public policy are supervised by Marthe Nyssens and involve researchers from CIRTES (Centre Interdisciplinaire de Recherche Travail et Société – Interdisciplinary Center for Research on Work and Society, UCL).
The first study focuses on employment and human resources management in social enterprises. A second issue relates to employment integration. It attempts to identify the institutional, organizational and inter-group processes that produce employment integration, particularly for ‘low-status’ workers and jobseekers. The next research area concerns the dynamic of social innovation in the provision of care services. The last issue relates to dynamics of social economy in the “South”.
Some other projects in this area, led by Anaïs Perilleux, focus on social enterprises in the south and analyze in the financial sector how the way surplus is distributed (in microfinance institutions) or on the relationship between gender and social performance (in financial cooperatives).
Main publications in 2015-2016
Bidet, E.; Defourny, J.; Nyssens, Marthes (eds). Entreprise sociale et économie sociale en Asie Orientale. In: RECMA –Revue des Etudes Coopératives, Mutualistes et Associatives, no.341, p. 22-25 (Juillet 2016)
Cooney, K.; Defourny, J.; Nyssens, Marthes; O’Shaughnessy, M. (eds). Work Integration Social Enterprise Models in a Comparative Perspective. In: Non-Profit Policy Forum, vol. 7, no. 4, p. 435-460 (December 2016).
Defourny, Jacques; Grønbjerg, Kirsten; Meijs, Lucas; Nyssens, Marthe. Voluntas Symposium: Comments on Salamon and Sokolowski’s Re-conceptualization of the Third Sector. In: Voluntas : international journal of voluntary and non-profit organizations, p. 1-16 (June 2016).
D’Espallier, B.; Périlleux, A., Vanroose, A. Are financial cooperatives crowded out by commercial banks in the process of financial sector development? In: Kyklos, Vol. 69, no. 1, p. 108-134. (January 2016).
Nyssens, Marthe; Perilleux, Anaïs. Understanding Cooperative Finance as a New Common. In: Annals of Public and Cooperative Economics, forthcoming.
VI. Social policies, poverty and development
In the field of social policies, poverty and development, we are studying the microeconomic determinants of poverty in developing countries and using field experiments to analyze the effectiveness of specific development policies. Three research projects, led by William Parienté, are focusing on the effects of relaxing either human capital or credit constraints in poor rural areas of Morocco and Pakistan.
VII. firms and local development policies.
Developed and developing countries implement regional or industrial policies to help lagging regions to catch-up or to promote the competitiveness of specific industries.
Florian Mayneris investigates these questions by analyzing the effects of cluster policies, which try to generate and enhance relationships between firms in the same sector located in the same region or other policies targeting deprived urban areas.
In another research, Florian Mayneris evaluates the effect of minimum wages on firms and their aggregate productivity focusing on the 2004 minimum wage reform in China.
Main publications in 2015-2016
Mayer, Thierry; Mayneris, Florian; Py, Lorianne. The impact of Urban Enterprise Zones on establishment location decisions and labor market outcomes: evidence from France. In: Journal of Economic Geography (published first online, October 12, 2015).
The faculty members involved are Muriel Dejemeppe, Marthe Nyssens, Florian Mayneris, William Parienté, Vincent Vandenberghe, and Bruno Van der Linden. These researches also involve senior researchers, Anaïs Perilleux and Corinna Ghirelli.
