Employment Protection Legislation and Profits: Evidence from European Countries

Abstract

The objective of the paper is to examine the relationship between employment protection regulations and profits in the European economies. Using regression analysis on the panel of 18 European countries over the period 1998-2008, we study the effect of EPL index on net operating surplus of mixed income (a measure of profits). Our findings confirm a statistically significant negative relation between EPL index and profits at the level of economies, implying that more rigid employment legislation, and by that higher hiring and firing costs, hinder an efficient allocation of resources, resulting in lower efficiency of companies and in decline of profits. Although the effect is small, we believe that further flexibilization of employment protection regulation presents an important determinant not only for labor market performance and productivity, but also for companies’ profits and therefore for the competitiveness of the European countries.