Estudios sobre la polarización del mercado de trabajo en economías avanzadas : causas, variedades nacionales y consecuencias distributivas

Abstract

Following each employment crisis, debate surrounding labour market inequalities escalates. When labour markets do not work properly, or whenever its performance worsens, the gaps dividing laborforce become more visible and public discussion on what are the appropriate labour market institutions intensifies. In this thesis we address this issue by relying on the insider-outsider literature and polarization studies. By doing so, we will analyze the problem of labour inequalities from the phenomenon of labour market polarization. Thus, in the first chapter, we will address how institutional variables influence labor market polarization of advanced economies. To do so, from a political economy approach that rests on the influential study by Esping-Andersen (1990) and recent work by Thelen (2009, 2012, 2014), we will address institutions taking into account their distributional implications. Specifically, we propose and calculate a set of composite indicators to measure the level of protection that institutions provide to those workers who occupy disadvantageous positions within the labour market. After applying a robustness test based on the potential classificatory use of these indexes, we proceed to test how the values of each indicator match with a classification of advanced economies inspired by national groupings used in the field of Comparative Political Economy. The results we obtain in both tests serve us to establish two criteria to use our institutional indicators. First, minor differences in indicators values are not stable, meaning that they are not significant and, therefore, that it is not possible to use them to conclude the existence of differentiated institutional features...