Youth and total unemployment rate : the impact of policies and institutions.

The paper estimates the impact of several institut ions and policies on youth and total unemployment rates, for a large set of developed co untries during the last three decades. The estimation techniques used is a fixed effect panel analysis. Our empirical analysis shows that, in addition to economic growth, economic freedom, labour market reforms, a high share of part time employment, and active labour market polices reduce unemployment and improve labour market performance. Considering the relatively worse condi tion of young people, our results permit to select - among the numerous policies and reforms ab le to reduce overall unemployment ‐ the measures with a comparatively higher effect on yout h unemployment.