The following is a letter to Luigi Zingales and Bethany McLean after listening to Season 2 Episode 76 […]
Tag: Labor Market
In the past, technological change has been slow enough so that the largest part of the population could spend their career following one profession, more or less. From Benz’ first gasoline car in 1886 to Ford’s Model T in 1908, the first mass-produced car, there was enough time for all conservative horse carriage riders to retire, while the younger one’s quickly learned to drive cars instead. The impact would have been quite different if that change had happened in less than a decade, which is the speed of development we see today.
While southern Europe is still struggling with the European debt crisis, Germany’s economy has, despite minor dents, not come to a halt and so far has withstood any recessive tendency. Especially in Germany, people seem to see a connection between Gerhard Schröder’s Agenda 2010, which was a labor-market reform, which began in 2003. The implementation occurred mainly until 2005 and focused on a liberalization of the labor market. A Japanese researcher even claimed to have found the exact impact, which these reforms have on Germany’s current economic success (Spiegel Online, 2013).