Gross Worker Flows and the Great Recession in the United Kingdom: Examining the Theory and Evidence

This thesis provides a detailed analysis of the gross worker flows data in the United Kingdom between 1997 and 2010, with particular emphasis on the 2008-09 recession and its aftermath. Utilising flows data from the Labour Force Survey (LFS), the dominant macroeconomic factors driving unemployment in the United Kingdom before, during, and after the recessionary period are identified. The findings of the thesis are then reconciled with other theoretical and empirical literature in the field. Amongst the salient findings of this thesis is a striking decline in job-to-job movements throughout and beyond the recent recession. This discovery adds a new dimension to the existing literature in the field. Other contributions include the use of detrended Gross Domestic Product (GDP) as the cyclical indicator (as opposed to another labour market indicator) and a split-sample analysis, which flags some interesting trend changes in labour market flow movements and transition rates, even prior to the Great Recession.