Abstract: Income shocks and limited upward mobility can undermine people’s well-being and economic prospects. Most cross-country studies on income mobility over people’s lives rely on survey data, but small samples limit detailed analysis by socio-demographic group or segment of the distribution. This paper presents first results of an OECD initiative collecting and harmonising administrative microdata to study income dynamics across countries. Applying rank-rank methods, it measures relative mobility in disposable incomes over five years for working-age people in Austria, Belgium, Canada and Estonia. The paper shows that: i) income persistence is strongest at the bottom and top of the distribution; ii) young people experience larger shifts in income ranks, though not always greater upward mobility; iii) women experience weaker upward mobility than men, particularly in the bottom half of the distribution; and iv) people with tertiary education move up the income ladder, at the expense of those with lower education.

Abstract: People’s ability to access essential services is key to their labour market and social inclusion. An important dimension of accessibility is physical accessibility, but little cross-country evidence exists on how close people live to the services facilities they need. This paper helps to address this gap, focusing on three types of essential services: Public Employment Services, primary schools and Early Childhood Education and Care. It collects and maps data on the location of these services for a selection of OECD countries and links them with data on population and transport infrastructure. This allows to compute travel times to the nearest service facility and to quantify disparities in accessibility at the regional level. The results highlight substantial inequalities in accessibility of essential services across and within countries. Although large parts of the population can easily reach these services in most countries, some people are relatively underserved. This is particularly the case in non-metropolitan and low-income regions. At the same time, accessibility seems to be associated with the potential demand for these services once accounting for other regional economic and demographic characteristics.

Abstract: A competition-friendly business regulatory environment is essential for the well-functioning of markets. It ensures that important policy goals are addressed, and market failures tackled. However, regulation can also create barriers to the entry and expansion of firms that may limit and distort competition and hinder the efficient allocation of resources, negatively affecting productivity and growth. Some of these barriers are necessary, but others may go beyond what is needed to address the policy objectives and the market failure(s) regulation is intended to solve. This paper relies on the last vintage of the Product Market Regulation indicators to determine to what extent Poland’s National Recovery and Resilience Plan aims to create a more competition-friendly business environment. The analysis suggests that only a limited number of the measures included in the Plan may address regulatory weaknesses identified by these indicators. Therefore, the paper suggests OECD best practices that the country could consider to remove unnecessary regulatory barriers and boost the benefits that the investments envisaged in the Plan could bring about.

Abstract: Appropriately designed Product Market Regulation (PMR) is essential to enhance productivity, boost economic growth and increase welfare. Regulation is needed to address market failures and guarantee the health and safety of consumers. However, by limiting the entry and expansion of firms, a too stringent regulatory environment can hinder an efficient allocation of resources both within and across industries. This paper provides a detailed review of PMR in Indonesia and analyses the country’s performance in this area relative to OECD countries, other G-20 members and regional peers. To do so, it relies on the OECD’s PMR Indicators, which have been recently compiled for Indonesia. These indicators assess the extent to which the regulatory framework of a country is competition-friendly across a range of sectors and regulatory areas. The analysis reveals that PMR in Indonesia is less conducive to competition than in most OECD countries. The scope for improvement is particularly great in areas such as barriers in network sectors, command-and-control regulation, public procurement, the governance of State-owned Enterprises (SOEs) and the extent to which the impact on competition is assessed when designing new regulation. The paper proposes concrete policy measures to align the regulatory environment of Indonesia with that of best performing countries.

Abstract: This chapter examines how the place where people are born and grow up shapes their opportunities in life. Opportunities to access quality education, jobs, and services vary significantly across and within countries. These differences matter, because most people stay close to their birthplace well into adulthood. Residents of metropolitan and higher-income regions tend to have better access to services, infrastructure, and employment, which leads to better educational and labour market outcomes. In contrast, people in poorer or remote regions face persistent disadvantages. The chapter documents these disparities drawing on regional and urban typologies based on OECD territorial definitions. It shows how place shapes opportunity and contributes to long-term inequalities in life outcomes.

Abstract: Opposing trends in longevity and fertility imply that the OECD population is becoming older. Without further policy action, the retirement of large cohorts will shrink the pool of productive workers, while the dependent population will expand. This chapter assesses the projected impact of these trends on GDP per capita growth to 2060 and puts them, as well as their implications for public finances, into a context of intergenerational disparities – documenting the diverging income and wealth trajectories across the generations and the implications for poverty among different cohorts. Possible complementary avenues for offsetting the negative growth effect of demographic change are considered and their potential quantified based on alternative simulation scenarios.

Abstract: This document assesses the links between the European National Recovery and Resilience Plans and the OECD Product Market Regulation (PMR) indicators. It examines how the plans, designed to mitigate the economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic and promote sustainable and digital transitions, address regulatory weaknesses identified by the PMR indicators in EU member states. The analysis focuses on the potential impact of the plans' measures on PMR scores, key regulatory weaknesses not addressed, and the regulatory setup in network sectors where infrastructure investments are planned. The goal is to determine how effectively the plans can improve competition and productivity across the EU economies.