Contribution of Gross Job Flows to the Dynamics of Corporate Restructuring in Croatia

While lack of corporate restructuring is often viewed as one of the major obstacles to economic growth in Croatia, the scant empirical evidence available does not corroborate this view. The paper evaluates more recent evidence based on gross job flows in order to shed more light on the Croatian experience with corporate restructuring. The findings support the view that a slowdown in corporate restructuring has been taking place during this decade. Gross job flows show that recent employment growth resulted from smaller job destruction, with job creation increasing only slightly. In addition, jobs are now being churned among enterprises that are more similar to each other than was the case in the 1990s. Therefore, all the measures used confirm that less corporate restructuring has been taking place during the last decade in comparison to 1990s, regardless of the still strong state presence in the economy.