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Perspectives on Australian Unemployment: The Impact of Wage Setting Institutions in the 1980s

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Economics of the Labour Market

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Abstract

The 1980s stand out in Australian post-World War II economic history as the decade of high unemployment. Unemployment rates have risen over the last forty years, averaging less than 2 per cent in the 1950s and 1960s, 3.7 per cent in the 1970s and 7.3 per cent over the 1980s. The consistent ratchetting up of unemployment rates since the early 1970s has only been reversed to any substantial extent in the period since 1983 (see Figure 4.3.1).1 The causes and implications of this recent experience constitute the subject of this paper.

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Authors
  1. Bruce J. Chapman
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  2. Steve Dowrick
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  3. P. N. Junankar
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© 1995 Australian National University

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Chapman, B.J., Dowrick, S., Junankar, P.N. (1995). Perspectives on Australian Unemployment: The Impact of Wage Setting Institutions in the 1980s. In: Economics of the Labour Market. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137555199_16

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