The focus of this course is the theoretical and empirical analysis of wage and employment determination in the labor market In connection, we examine the role of public policy and how it affects wage and employment outcomes in Europe and in the Austrian labor market.

Most of us allocate a substantial fraction of our time to the labor market. Our action on the labor market influences many aspects of our life: our wealth, the goods we consume, whom we associate with, where we vacation, etc. In this course, we explore the ideas economists use to understand how labor markets work. This will aid our understanding of topics such as education and training, discrimination and the impact of antidiscrimination programs, changes in wage inequality over time, immigration, unions, unemployment, and poverty

Course Grades

The final grade is composed of

Class attendance and class participation 10%

Presentation and presentation slides 45%

Final Exam 45%

The final exam will be closed book, closed notes exams. It covers the material presented in the lectures and seminars and consist of short answer type questions.

Positive grades on the courses in micro and macro economics of the Master’s program are prerequisite for participating in Labor Economics;

During theregistration period, students will be placed on a first-come, first-servebasis. Once registration closes, more seats will be made available. Studentsfrom the waiting list will then be placed based on their cohort.Students from an older cohort will be placed before students from youngercohorts. If you are registered, but do not intend to take the class, we ask youto deregister during the registration period. There is no guarantee for a seatin this lecture!

Email: rboeheim@wu.ac.at

office hours: by appointment