This was a period of the worst financial crisis ever occurred in Southeast Asia. The crisis started first in Thailand in around mid. 1997 which led the Thai baht to collapse. Then, just in few months, the crisis also impacted several other countries in the region such as Indonesia and South Korea.
Published in Chapter:
Economic Growth, Labor Market Segmentation, and Labor Productivity: A Story from Indonesia
Tulus T. H. Tambunan (Center for Industry, SME and Business Competition Studies, Indonesia)
Copyright: © 2017
|Pages: 26
DOI: 10.4018/978-1-5225-2008-5.ch019
Abstract
This chapter examines economic growth, labor market segmentation, informal employment, and labor productivity in Indonesia from 1990-2015. It shows four important facts. First, Indonesia was ever among countries in Southeast Asia with the highest economic growth before the country was severely hit by the Asian financial crisis in 1997/98. In 1999, the country started to recover, and since then, the economy has performed exceptionally well until these days. Second, total employment increased continuously, although as a percentage of total labor force, it tends to decline. Second, total labor productivity also continued to increase. Third, employment is still dominated by the informal sector. This chapter also discusses labor market policy in Indonesia. This chapter concludes that there are many factors that simultaneously determine directly or indirectly the growth of labor productivity, including good macroeconomic management and effective labor market policies.