Labor market studies have long been a central theme of IUI research, covering such topics as labor mobility, education and productivity on the one hand, and wage and salary formation on the other. This area has become even more important during the last decade as new legislation affecting the labor market is proposed and enacted and as new demands for rapid structural adjustment are imposed on Swedish industry by changing international market conditions.
Since comparative research from different countries is especially valuable in addressing these issues, IUI organized a small conference in July, 1979, around some of them. The papers given at the conference are presented in this volume. They cover a number of important areas, and several of them compare labor markets in Sweden and the U.S. The topics are closely related to the economic policy debate of today in both countries: youth unemployment, the determinants of labor supply and the relationships between profits and wage change. Both theoretical propositions as well as the effects of labor market intervention policies have been analyzed.
