Publication: More Jobs, Better Jobs : A Priority for Egypt
Loading...
Published
2014-06
ISSN
Date
2014-11-19
Author(s)
Editor(s)
Abstract
Much of the current debate around the recent economic crisis in the Arab Republic of Egypt has focused on unemployment. Although unemployment is an important marker of labor market health, the jobs problem in Egypt precedes the recent crisis and is manifested markedly in other labor market metrics. Indeed, the link between growth and unemployment in Egypt is weak, particularly for men. This chapter argues that the reason for this weak link is partly related to decades of flawed industrial policies that have discouraged investment in employment-generating activities. Industrial policies, including those implemented in the mid-2000s, were never focused on mitigating market failures to promote the emergence of fast-growing, high-productivity firms. Instead, they have worked to preserve insider privileges, leading to growth in sectors that are not labor intensive. Policy makers therefore need to look beyond supply-side focused labor market policies to accelerate employment growth.
Link to Data Set
Citation
“World Bank. 2014. More Jobs, Better Jobs : A Priority for Egypt. © http://hdl.handle.net/10986/20584 License: CC BY 3.0 IGO.”
Digital Object Identifier
Associated URLs
Associated content
Other publications in this report series
Journal
Journal Volume
Journal Issue
Collections
Related items
Showing items related by metadata.
Publication Labor Market Policies under a Youth Bulge : How to Benefit from Demographic Dividend in Pakistan(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2012-12)This paper assesses labor market trends and outcomes in Pakistan over the past decade. It shows that despite a high rate of employment growth, labor market outcomes have been disappointing: most jobs have been created in low productivity sectors/activities, and even if they provide a minimum level of income to often avoid poverty, they remain low quality jobs providing little or no protection to workers against shocks. In addition, female participation rates for women are very low and there are large income disparities between rural and urban areas, and across sectors. A fundamental part of the problem is the low level of education of the labor force. Pakistan is currently in the midst of a demographic transition that is bringing a growing number of youth into the labor market. This youth bulge that is unwinding opens both challenges and opportunities. Challenges because of the need to create enough jobs to employ new entrants; Opportunities, because if this is done the country will enjoy a demographic dividend , as the share of those employed relative to the dependent increases, driving up income per capita and standards of living.Publication The Unfulfilled Promise of Oil and Growth : Poverty, Inclusion and Welfare in Iraq 2007-2012(Washington, DC, 2014-12-01)Iraq appears to have firmly entered the ranks of upper middle-income countries in 2012, having experienced strong economic growth following the establishment of a civilian elected government in 2005-06. In 2012 the years of growth culminated in a per capita GDP of 2472 constant 2005 US$. This three-volume poverty and inclusion assessment provides the first in-depth analysis of Iraq's economic and social development during the period of 2007 to 2012. Volume 1 is an overview of the economic climate in Iraq, providing brushstroke descriptions of its poverty reduction plans, labor markets, public health data, and education focal points. Volume 2 is a nine-chapter report on the years between 2007 and 2012, a period of relative stability in Iraq. 2007 marks the end of sectarian violence, which lasted until 2012, prior to the militancy and insurgency in the northern governorates of the summer of 2014. The country has been a nexus of conflict and fragility since the early 1980s, and has experienced multiple types of conflict: insurgency, international war, sectarian strife, persistent terrorism, regional fragmentation, and spillovers from conflict in other countries. What should have been a promising endowment of natural resources of land, oil and gas, as well of human capital, did not provide the foundation for poverty reduction and shared prosperity. The realization of potential was confounded by war and repression. A key priority of the Government of Iraq since 2005-06 has been to fill the huge knowledge gap in terms of a deeper understanding of the state of the economy and of a range of socioeconomic indicators of welfare with the objective of building a strong evidence base for effective policy making. The rich analyses presented in this report go well beyond counting the poor. It gives an incisive understanding of the multi-layered development challenges faced by the nation, which serves as a testament to the commitment of the Government of Iraq, the staff of the Central Statistics Office, and the Kurdistan Region Statistics Office. It will form the basis for a new strategy for Iraq's development and ensure broad-based welfare improvements for the population. Volume 3 consists of nine annexes and nine references in the forms of tables, boxes, and equations used in the methodologies.Publication Characteristics and Determinants of Internal Labor Mobility in Ukraine(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2012-05)Over the past 20 years Ukraine experienced fundamental structural changes due to transition to a market economy and integration with the world. Transition reforms accompanied by the collapse of traditional trade and production links with the other republics of the former USSR and Comecon countries entailed asymmetric effects on regions, reflecting an uneven distribution of winners and losers from transition. Geographical mobility of labor is one of the major mechanisms (alongside with capital mobility, wage and price flexibility, and institutional mechanisms for redistributing income across regions) in facilitating regional adjustment to idiosyncratic shocks. The ability of workers to move freely from one geographical location to another inside the borders of their country, in pursuing the same occupation or changing occupations, is of particular importance for efficient matching of labor demand and supply and reducing structural unemployment. This paper seeks to fill gap in the literature on patterns of internal labor mobility in Ukraine, its main characteristics and potential for reducing persistent regional labor market disparities and imbalances in economic and human development. The next chapters of the paper are organized as follows: second chapter evaluates the magnitude of disparities in regional labor market and socio-economic indicators over time, with a special focus on its potential impact on decision of individuals to migrate to another settlement; third chapter provides an overview of the available data sources on internal labor mobility in Ukraine, quantifies internal migration based on aggregate administrative data, discusses its trends over time and compares it levels to those found in developed and transition economies. Fourth chapter provides multivariate statistical analysis of the determinants of inter-regional migration in 2002-2010 based on administrative region-level data. Fifth chapter summarizes the findings of empirical studies on determinants of the migration decision of Ukrainians. Sixth chapter examines short-term labor migration including everyday commuting in 2005-2010 and measures its covariates using individual-level Labor Force Survey (LFS) data. Seventh chapter summarizes the main findings and concludes.Publication Sri Lanka - Demographic Transition : Facing the Challenges of an Aging Population with Few Resources(Washington, DC, 2012-10)As a result of low fertility rates and high life expectancy, the current demographic trends in Sri Lanka include a declining share of children and increasing share of elderly, and (for now) an increasing working age population. Sri Lanka has a unique window of opportunity to take advantage of the high share of working age population to stimulate economic growth, but the other two emerging population issues spur questions on their own. In this context, the report discusses some of the economic implications of demographic transition in Sri Lanka, focusing on employment and productivity related issues on one side; and performance of cash transfer programs aiming to assist the poor and vulnerable groups on the other. This report quantifies Sri Lanka's demographic change by providing updated population projections and by applying National Transfers Accounts methodology documenting how the demographic change and aging contribute to life-cycle deficit and to Sri Lanka's employment and labor market. The challenges and opportunities associated with the upcoming demographic transition are highlighted, focusing on the functioning of the labor markets and the social safety net system. The report discusses different avenues that the country can take to make its labor market more efficient and inclusive, and offset some of the disadvantages faced by the poor and vulnerable households. The analysis in this report suggests that timely policy actions can enable Sri Lanka to effectively cope with its changing demographic structure.Publication Good Jobs in Turkey(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2013-11)This joint study, by the World Bank and the Turkish Ministry of Development, explores the status and effects of good jobs in Turkey s current economy. After a brief account of economic events, it examines the relationship between growth and employment in Turkey, with a particular regard to the participation of different social groups in the labor market, such as women and youth. It then analyzes where jobs are being created and which activities are the most productive for the Turkish economy, and assesses if jobs have moved to more productive activities in recent years. Finally, the report proceeds to measure the impact of different types of jobs on the welfare of an entire household and on the household s relative position in the overall income distribution.
Users also downloaded
Showing related downloaded files
Publication World Development Report 2018(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2018)Every year, the World Bank's World Development Report takes on a topic of central importance to global development. The 2018 Report, Learning to Realize Education's Promise, is the first ever devoted entirely to education. Now is an excellent time for it: education has long been critical for human welfare, but is even more so in a time of rapid economic change. The Report explores four main themes. First, education's promise: Education is a powerful instrument for eradicating poverty and promoting shared prosperity, but fulfilling its potential requires better policies - both within and outside the education system. Second, the learning crisis: Despite gains in education access, recent learning assessments show that many young people around the world, especially from poor families, are leaving school unequipped with even the most foundational skills they need for life. At the same time, internationally comparable learning assessments show that skills in many middle-income countries lag far behind what those countries aspire to. Third, promising interventions to improve learning: Research from areas such as brain science, pedagogical innovations, or school management have identified interventions that promote learning by ensuring that learners are prepared, that teachers are skilled as well as motivated, and that other inputs support the teacher-learner relationship. Fourth, learning at scale: Achieving learning throughout an education system will require more than just scaling up effective interventions. Change requires overcoming technical and political barriers by deploying salient metrics for mobilizing actors and tracking progress, building coalitions for learning, and being adaptive when implementing programs.Publication The Global Findex Database 2025: Connectivity and Financial Inclusion in the Digital Economy(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2025-07-16)The Global Findex 2025 reveals how mobile technology is equipping more adults around the world to own and use financial accounts to save formally, access credit, make and receive digital payments, and pursue opportunities. Including the inaugural Global Findex Digital Connectivity Tracker, this fifth edition of Global Findex presents new insights on the interactions among mobile phone ownership, internet use, and financial inclusion. The Global Findex is the world’s most comprehensive database on digital and financial inclusion. It is also the only global source of comparable demand-side data, allowing cross-country analysis of how adults access and use mobile phones, the internet, and financial accounts to reach digital information and resources, save, borrow, make payments, and manage their financial health. Data for the Global Findex 2025 were collected from nationally representative surveys of about 145,000 adults in 141 economies. The latest edition follows the 2011, 2014, 2017, and 2021 editions and includes new series measuring mobile phone ownership and internet use, digital safety, and frequency of transactions using financial services. The Global Findex 2025 is an indispensable resource for policy makers in the fields of digital connectivity and financial inclusion, as well as for practitioners, researchers, and development professionals.Publication World Development Report 2022(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2022-02-15)World Development Report 2022: Finance for an Equitable Recovery examines the central role of finance in the economic recovery from COVID-19. Based on an in-depth look at the consequences of the crisis most likely to affect low- and middle-income economies, it advocates a set of policies and measures to mitigate the interconnected economic risks stemming from the pandemic—risks that may become more acute as stimulus measures are withdrawn at both the domestic and global levels. Those policies include the efficient and transparent management of nonperforming loans to mitigate threats to financial stability, insolvency reforms to allow for the orderly reduction of unsustainable debts, innovations in risk management and lending models to ensure continued access to credit for households and businesses, and improvements in sovereign debt management to preserve the ability of governments to support an equitable recovery.Publication Digital Progress and Trends Report 2023(Washington, DC: World Bank, 2024-03-05)Digitalization is the transformational opportunity of our time. The digital sector has become a powerhouse of innovation, economic growth, and job creation. Value added in the IT services sector grew at 8 percent annually during 2000–22, nearly twice as fast as the global economy. Employment growth in IT services reached 7 percent annually, six times higher than total employment growth. The diffusion and adoption of digital technologies are just as critical as their invention. Digital uptake has accelerated since the COVID-19 pandemic, with 1.5 billion new internet users added from 2018 to 2022. The share of firms investing in digital solutions around the world has more than doubled from 2020 to 2022. Low-income countries, vulnerable populations, and small firms, however, have been falling behind, while transformative digital innovations such as artificial intelligence (AI) have been accelerating in higher-income countries. Although more than 90 percent of the population in high-income countries was online in 2022, only one in four people in low-income countries used the internet, and the speed of their connection was typically only a small fraction of that in wealthier countries. As businesses in technologically advanced countries integrate generative AI into their products and services, less than half of the businesses in many low- and middle-income countries have an internet connection. The growing digital divide is exacerbating the poverty and productivity gaps between richer and poorer economies. The Digital Progress and Trends Report series will track global digitalization progress and highlight policy trends, debates, and implications for low- and middle-income countries. The series adds to the global efforts to study the progress and trends of digitalization in two main ways: · By compiling, curating, and analyzing data from diverse sources to present a comprehensive picture of digitalization in low- and middle-income countries, including in-depth analyses on understudied topics. · By developing insights on policy opportunities, challenges, and debates and reflecting the perspectives of various stakeholders and the World Bank’s operational experiences. This report, the first in the series, aims to inform evidence-based policy making and motivate action among internal and external audiences and stakeholders. The report will bring global attention to high-performing countries that have valuable experience to share as well as to areas where efforts will need to be redoubled.Publication The Invisible Poor : A Portrait of Rural Poverty in Argentina(World Bank, 2010-02-01)Many of the poorest Argentines are invisible in official statistics. Four million rural residents and another 12 million in small urban areas lie outside the reach of the Permanent Household Survey (EPH), which is the basis for poverty figures and most data on social conditions in the country. According to the best estimate, roughly a third of rural residents, more than a million people, live in poverty. The urban bias common too many countries have been accentuated by the lack of data on the rural poor. With little information on their condition, it is exceedingly difficult for policy makers to design policies and programs to help move people out of poverty. The report is organized as follows: chapter one profiles rural poverty base on the limited existing data, including the first in-depth analysis of rural poverty ever conducted with the 2001 population census. Chapter two presents findings from the new qualitative study of the rural poor conducted in the first half of 2007. Finally, chapter three concludes with a discussion of methodology for rural poverty analysis, focusing on the issues related to expanding the EPH to full national coverage.