Labour markets and education

Labour market and education policy issues, immigration and integration are important research topics at VATT. We explore how the education system can be made to work better for all, and which policy measures make the most difference in getting more people into the labour market.

The research theme’s multiyear and multidisciplinary My Path project is about preventing the social exclusion of young people. In the course of the project, we aim to identify the mechanisms of social exclusion, study the long-term effects of dropping out from school and assess the success of earlier policy reforms. The objective is to develop an evidence-based programme, the purpose of which is to facilitate transitioning into secondary education by helping young people with their education choices.

Education, skills and future of work are among our key research subjects. The topics we are focusing on in this project, funded by the Academy of Finland, include:

  • how globalization is affecting the demand for skills
  • supply and demand for graduate skills
  • immigrants in the Finnish labour market and education system.

Other current research topics include:

  • unemployment insurance and unemployment duration
  • payroll systems: the use of different forms of pay in Finnish firms over time, and its effects on wage distribution
  • various policy reforms promoting employment: employment programme supplements, the youth guarantee.
  • intergenerational effects of integration plans and various policy reforms promoting employment
  • effects of education system reforms, inequality in education

Scientific evaluation of Finland's basic income experiment has begun

VATT has strong expertise in the planning and scientific evaluation of social experiments. This is topical at the moment as Finland is planning major reforms involving experiments. Our researchers had a key role in planning the experimental design and survey sample of Finland's basic income experiment 2017-2018, and will participate in the ongoing evaluation study of it.

We have gathered the essential findings from our studies on education on one page.