| Abstract [eng] |
Minimum Wage Effects on Labour Market in Lithuanian Municipalities The main purpose of this master thesis is to to analyze the effect of minimum wage increases on the dynamics of labour market in Lithuanian municipalities excluding cities. The work consists of three main parts: the analysis of scientific literature, the research methodology and research results, and conclusion and recommendations. Literature analysis reviews the concept of the monthly minimum wage, its impact on the labour market, scientific research on effect of increasing minimum wage on the labour market dynamics. Afterwards, research design was set up. The main purpose of this study was to investigate what was the impact of recent minimum wage increases in Lithuania on the employment or unemployment of municipalities. In order to achieve this, four different panel data models were constructed using data from 55 municipalities. The research done revealed that unemployment was increased in the short-term as a result of increases in the minimum wage when looking into quarterly data; however, no such effect was present when data with annual frequency was inspected. Demographic data as well as macroeconomic data was found to have had a more significant impact on labour market dynamics rather than the changes in the wage levels. The conclusions and recommendations summarize the findings that increases in monthly minimum wage did not have any impact on the labour market dynamics in the long-terms. The author has also found that the models did not indicate any significant differences in the labour market dynamics of different municipalities. Consequently, it was suggested that any further research conducted could focus on the national labour market dynamics as this allows usage of wider scope of data. |
