Labour Markets, Employment Policies and the Single Currency

Abstract

The general focus of immediate attention, with respect to the euro single currency, is on macroeconomic issues, fiscal and monetary policy and current account imbalances. Such a focus has been prominent in this book. In this chapter we discuss some labour market and employment policy issues. We remarked in chapter 1 that labour market and employment policies are not the remit of the Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) but rather a combination of policies at the level of the European Union (EU) and policies coming under national ‘competencies’. Insofar as there is coordination of policies, this largely comes under the ‘open method of coordination’ rather than being subordinated to EU-level decisions. However, within a currency union, some highly significant questions arise, and two related ones are the focus of attention in this chapter.