Evaluating Latvia S Active Labour Market Policies

This report on Latvia is the sixth country study published in a series of reports looking into how policies connect people with jobs. It focuses on Latvia's long-term unemployed and those at risk of long-term unemployment.

Latvia has undergone major economic and social change since the early 1990s. Despite an exceptionally deep recession following the global financial crisis, impressive economic growth over the past two decades has narrowed income and productivity gaps relative to comparator countries in the OECD.

This book argues that active labour market policies are necessary to improve the position of the unemployed but have so far performed relatively poorly. The contributing authors seek ways to improve active labour market policy and consider three means of doing so: improving the quality by better targeting and by better-designed measures, more efficient implementation and delivery, and better performance by benchmarking the various implementation agencies involved.

This review analyses the key issues in labour market and social policy facing each of the Baltic States - Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania - given their specific economic and social trends.

Also available on the Bank's web site.

This report uses rich administrative data from different registers in Finland to evaluate the impact of two types of training available to jobseekers: labour market training; and self-motivated training. Training outcomes are examined that go beyond the probability of employment and how different population groups are affected.