Unemployment duration: an analysis of incomplete, completed, and multiple spells in Emilia-Romagna

• Published in: Quality & quantity 2001-05, Vol.35 (2), p.203-230
• Main Authors: LALLA, Michele, PATTARIN, Francesco
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Hazard Rate Models; History, theory and methodology; Italy; Methodological Problems; Methodology; Methodology (Data Analysis); Sociology; Studies; Unemployment
• ISSN: 0033-5177; 1573-7845
• DOI: 10.1023/A:1010355026369

Sets of incomplete and completed spells of unemployment wereobtained from the Italian Quarterly Labour Force Survey,carried out by ISTAT in Emilia-Romagna (1993:1-1995:1).The data were analysed through a proportional hazards modelwith a Weibull specification of the baseline hazard, includingboth unobserved heterogeneity applied to the scale parameterof the duration distribution, and telescoping effect to accountfor spikes in the distribution of unemployment spells.They were compared formally also with a non-proportional hazardmodel based on a log-logistic distribution of duration.The estimation of the parameters was carried out separately on bothcompleted spells and quarterly incomplete spells to ascertaindifferences and to envisage the potential seasonal effect.The results showed that the shape parameters changed over time.The parameters of each covariate proved to be statisticallystable over time and were also equal to the parameters ofthe completed spells model.Therefore, the analysis of incomplete spells is fairly feasiblewhen an even (closed form) baseline hazard function is suitablefor data.[PUBLICATION ABSTRACT]