Active Labour Market Policy to Combat Long-term Unemployment. Findings of an Evaluation of the National Action Plan for Employment

Active labour market policies were given a major boost in Austria within the scope of the National Action Plan for Employment (NAP). Expenditure for labour market policy measures rose substantially in 1999; excellent economic conditions, together with NAP initiatives, improved the labour market situation, and as a result unemployment declined considerably in 1999 while outflow from unemployment to work increased noticeably. However, the positive data need to be interpreted with care when it comes to the situation of the long-term unemployed. Taking the indicators to measure long-term exclusion from working life, the improvement appears to have been markedly less pronounced: whereas the stock of recipients of unemployment assistance declined at a rate similar to that of the stock of unemployed, the outflow from long-term unemployment to work, on the other hand, actually dwindled.