Employer Of Last Resort As A Public Employment Program To Reduce Unemployment

Abstract

This paper objective is to assess Employer of Last Resort (ELR) program, a heterodox policy recommendation by Hyman Minsky on how full employment could be reached under price stability by governments, and discuss basic theoretical frameworks in order to facilitate capturing advantages and disadvantages of this approach. The program is a public-employment policy funded by government that aims to achieve zero unemployment by recruiting all (unemployed) workers who are willing and able to work but cannot find a job and ready to work in public sector projects. For this reason, the article begins with a brief analysis of conceptual perspective to analyze the implications of ELR, followed by an analysis on how this program operates as a buffer-stock mechanism operating on a fixed price/floating quantity rule. This kind of policy is crucial especially for developing countries as Turkey where the majority of labor is in the informal sector with no social protection and there is no doubt that working under an ELR program would contribute to social assistance and security and to making labor markets work more effectively for the poor.

Keywords

• Unemployment,Employment,Post Keynesian,Employer of Last Resort

İşsizliğin Azaltılmasında Kamusal Bir İstihdam Modeli Olarak Nihai İşveren Programı

Abstract

Bu çalışmanın amacı, Hyman Minsky'nin hükümetler tarafından fiyat istikrarı altında tam istihdama nasıl ulaşılabileceğine dair bir heterodoks politika önerisi olan devletin nihai işveren olma politikasını değerlendirmek ve bu yaklaşımın avantajlarını ve dezavantajlarını kavrayabilmek için temel teorik çerçevede tartışmaktır. Program, hükümet tarafından finanse edilen ve iş arayan, ancak iş bulamayan ve kamu sektörü projelerinde çalışmaya hazır olan tüm işsizleri ise alarak sıfır işsizlik elde etmeyi amaçlayan bir kamu istihdam politikasıdır. Bu nedenle, bu çalışma, programın etkilerini analiz etmek için kavramsal bakış açısının kısa bir analizi ile başlamaktadır ve bunu daha sonra bu programın sabit fiyat kuralı üzerinde çalışan bir tampon stok mekanizması olarak nasıl çalıştığı üzerine odaklanan bir analiz izleyecektir. Bu tür bir politika özellikle Türkiye gibi işgücünün çoğunluğunun gayri resmi sektörlerde sosyal güvence olmaksızın çalışmak zorunda kaldığı ülkeler için kritik öneme sahiptir zira etkin bir nihai işveren programı altında çalışmanın sosyal yardım ve güvenliğe katkı sağlayacağından ve yoksul kesim açısından işgücü piyasalarının etkinliğini arttıracağından şüphe yoktur.

Keywords

• İşsizlik,İstihdam,Post Keynesyen,Nihai İşveren

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