Employment policies: learning from experience.

Summary The back cover states: "With unemployment, we've tried everything!" said François Mitterrand thirty years ago. It would probably be appropriate to add "but have we given ourselves the means to learn? Because we have not invested enough in a truly scientific evaluation of our employment policies, our knowledge of the causes of unemployment and our ability to solve it has not progressed much. Some training, employment subsidy and support programs implemented in developed countries have been meticulously evaluated. The weakness of their impacts demonstrates that unemployment cannot be eradicated by investing in this or that type of action. But these programs can be improved and can help us get rid of unemployment. This requires careful analysis of needs and behaviors, as well as broader use of rigorous evaluation. Ultimately, isn't it our impatience to test actions without giving ourselves time to study their effects that has trapped us in long-term unemployment?