1. ¹Heriot-Watt University, UK
2. ²CEU Labor Project, Hungary
3. ³IZA, Germany
4. ⁴Upjohn Institute for Employment Research, USA
5. ⁵300 South Westnedge Avenue, Kalamazoo, MI 49007, USA. E-mail: earle@upjohn.org
6. ⁶CLMS, Higher School of Economics, Russia
7. ⁷University of Bologna, Italy
8. ⁸Labor Group EROC, Kiev School of Economics, Ukraine
9. ⁹CEU Labor Project, Institute of Economics of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, Hungary
10. ¹⁰City University of New York, Staten Island College, USA

Abstract

This paper looks behind the standard, publicly available labor force statistics relied upon in most studies of transition economy labor markets. We analyse microdata on detailed labor force survey (LFS) responses in Russia, Romania, and Estonia to measure nonstandard, boundary forms and alternative definitions of employment and unemployment. Our calculations show that measured rates are quite sensitive to definition, particularly in the treatment of household production (subsistence agriculture), unpaid family helpers, and discouraged workers, while the categories of part-time work and other forms of marginal attachment are still relatively unimportant. We find that tweaking the official definitions in apparently minor ways can produce alternative employment rates that are sharply higher in Russia but much lower in Romania and slightly lower in Estonia, and alternative unemployment rates that are sharply higher in Romania and moderately higher in Estonia and Russia.