Baker, Glyn, Howell, and Schmitt Data
The attached zip file contains the most recent version of an annual dataset (1960-2000) of labor-market institutions and outcomes for 20 major countries in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).
The underlying source of almost all the data in the dataset is the OECD. The particular version of the data here draws heavily on a dataset created by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) for a chapter called "Unemployment and Labor Market Institutions: Why Reforms Pay Off," in the April 2003 edition of the World Economic Outlook. The IMF, in turn, relied heavily on an earlier a dataset constructed by Steve Nickell and Luca Nunziata.
The zip file contains five files:
- create_imf_lmi_4.do:
- A Stata do-file that describes the sources and definitions of the final data set.
- prepare_imf_lmi_5.do:
- A Stata do-file that describes transformations of the basic variables for use in subsequent analysis.
- imf_lmi_ready_ver6.dta:
- The Stata 6.0 dataset produced by the two preceding do-files.
- imf_lmi_ver6.xls:
- An .xls-format spreadsheet version of the same data.
- LMIDB.pdf:
- A .pdf document by Stephen Nickell and Luca Nunziata called "Labour Market Institutions Database," which describes the variables that form the basis of the original Nickell and Nunziata dataset.
Baker, Glyn, Howell, and Schmitt used this dataset for "Unemployment and Labor Market Institutions: The Failure of the Empirical Case for Deregulation," a paper prepared for the International Labor Organization in December 2003. A longer, working-paper version of this paper [PDF] is available from the Schwartz Center for Economic Policy Analysis at the New School.
Please let me know if you find any errors in the files.