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Abstract

Little is known about the influences that employment density and other local labor-market conditions have on transitions from unemployment to employment in nonmetropolitan areas. The empirical job search model developed in this paper finds that individual characteristics, unemployment rates, commuting patterns, and trade and service sector growth all significantly influence the rate of exit of unemployment following job loss. Measures of local labor-market density, by contrast, appear to have little direct impact on the rate of exit of unemployment. The results of the paper suggest that the differential targeting of remote areas with job search assistance for displaced workers is not justified. Programs to assist nonmetropolitan labor market transitions must, on the other hand, recognize constraints that gender, race, and employment history create to the exit of unemployment.

Publication Date

12-31-2000

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