In my post of October 21st, I argued that labour market reforms have been the weakest link in the process of European economic reform and that, regardless of the Lisbon strategy, national governemnts have mostly followed the route of convenience leading to proliferation of low-wage jobs and lower labour productivity. Government labour market policies have [...]

When initially set forth, the Lisbon strategy was almost greeted with enthusiasm. For some, say the economists (not identified with professional economists only), the Lisbon strategy was making clear that European governemnts were committed to reforming their market policies and economic and social institutions in order to be able to better accommodate economic globalisation, sooner [...]