Economic Growth and Regional Labour Market Development in Iran's Provinces: Okun's Law in a Spatial Context

The inverse relationship between economic growth and unemployment rate is known as Okun’s law in the economic literature. According to the importance of Okun's law on economic policy, investigating the relationship between unemployment rate and economic growth is very important at provincial level. Also, with regard to labor mobility between provinces based on economic conditions, spatial and spillover effects are essential in regional studies; therefore, the main objectives of this paper are to investigate Okun's law in Iran's provinces with spatial econometric approach and whether Okun’s law can be used as a rule of thumb for surveying the labor market response to changes in regional economic growth, in Iran's provinces. A panel data set for 30 provinces during period of 2005 to 2013. The results show that unemployment rates and economic growth of provinces have spatial dependence and labor market performance is influenced by macroeconomic situation and its features the economic situation in neighboring provinces. Hence, in this study spatial panel is employed to investigate Okun’s law. The results of spatial panel (SAC) approve accuracy of Okun's law in Iran's provinces; and the development of regional labor market is not limited to the provincial borders and spillovers to other provinces.