摘要:This paper applies recent advances in the study of labor market dynamics to a
representative developing country with a large unregulated of “informal” sector,
Mexico. It finds, first, that the formal salaried sector shows the same
procyclical job finding rate and mildly countercyclical separation behavior
identified in the recent US literature by Shimer (2005a) and Hall (2005). The
unregulated informal sector, however, shows reasonable acyclicality in the job
finding rate coupled with sharp countercyclical movements in the job separation
rate, consistent with standard small firm dynamics and Davis and Haltiwanger
(1992 and 1999). The differential behavior of regulated and unregulated sectors,
and the finding of relative wage rigidity in the former, sheds suggestive light
on the roots of countercyclical job finding behavior in the US. Second, the
patterns of worker transitions between all sectors, formal and informal
correspond to the job-to-job dynamics observed in the US and not to the
traditional idea of informality constituting the inferior sector of a segmented
market. That said, the counter cyclical job finding in the formal sector
combined with the acyclical job finding in informality does lead to the latter
absorbing relatively more labor during
关键词:Gross worker flows, Labor market dynamics, Informality, Developing Countries