Links
A wide range of material surrounding the labour market, such as data, research, or legal information, is found on the International Labour Organization's.
ILO site
Other languages

Austrian flag German flag Swiss flag
Diese Seiten gibt es zum Teil auch
auf Deutsch
The labour market and unemployment
The labour market is at the core of current macroeconomics--because unemployment has turned into the biggest worry many countries battle, but also for its vulnerability of and the changes forced upon it in times of accelerating internationalization, known as globalization.

Understanding the labour market is a prerequisite for informed discussions of issues surrounding unemployment and growth. To facilitate such study, this section offers elearning resources ranging from basic material on the production fuction, via concise introductions to labour demand and supply, to a refined interactive labour market applet. Working through the accompanying guided exercise will provide you with a quicker and deeper unterstanding of how the labour market works than studying any textbook can.

At the core of the labour market is the three-dimensional production function that employs capital and labour as inputs to produce goods and services.
This applet visualises one specific type of production function, the so-called Cobb-Douglas function, and lets you interact - by changing parameter values and rotating the graph to let you look at it from different angles.

The standard graph routinely used to represent and discuss the labour market is displayed in two dimensions. This animation shows how to extract a 2D partial production function from a 3D production function.
 
This applet features the basic labour market model. Guided exercises let you experience how labour demand is related to profit maximization by firms, how labour supply derves from trade union utility maximization, ahd how voluntary differs from involuntary unemployment.

 A very compact explanation of the labour demand curve. It discusses the derivation of the labour demand curve from the partial production function, supported by an animated display.
 
A viewlet-based test of your labour market expertise, focussing on your ability to see how real world events bear on labour supply and demand curves.

A very compact explanation of the labour supply curve. It first looks at individual households, then at collective behaviour articulated by trade unions.

Copyright 1997-2013, Manfred Gärtner. All rights reserved.