TY  - RPRT
        AU  - Orszag, Mike
AU  - Snower, Dennis J.
        TI  - Anatomy of Policy Complementarities
        PY  - 1999/May/
        PB  - Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)
        CY  - Bonn
        T2  - IZA Discussion Paper
        IS  - 41
        UR  - https://www.iza.org/publications/dp41
        AB  - The analysis provides a new explanation for two widespread problems concerning European unemployment policy: the disappointingly small effect of many past reform measures on unemployment, and the political difficulties in implementing more extensive reform programs. We argue that the heart of these problems may be the failure of many European governments to implement broad-based reform strategies. Our analysis suggests that major unemployment policies are characterised by economic complementarities (in the sense that the effectiveness of one policy depends on the implementation of other policies) and political complementarities (in that the ability to gain political consent for one policy depends on the acceptance of other policies). Under these circumstances, incremental, small-scale adjustments of existing policy packages are doomed to failure. Our analysis suggests instead that the European unemployment problem should be tackled through "broad" reforms that exploit the salient economic and political complementarities among individual policy measures.
        KW  - Labor market policy
KW  - economic complementarities
KW  - political economy
KW  - unemployment
KW  - unemployment benefits
KW  - taxation
KW  - inequality
        ER  -