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Hasan Tekguc

Kadir Has University

I thank World of Labor community for giving me the opportunity to be part of this evidence based policy dialogue. Writing for World of Labor is both exciting and challanging. Writing for policymakers and wider audience forced me to consider labor market issues from a broader perspective. Summarizing and documenting all the issues for the broader audience have also clarified the main issues for me as well. I hope this country labor market report will stimulate fruitful policy discussions and even reforms!

IZA World of Labor role

Author

Current position

Kadir Has University Professor of Economics

Research interest

Development economics, labor economics, poverty, inequality

Website

https://sites.google.com/view/tekguchasan/

Positions/functions as a policy advisor

Academic Consultant to Turkish Education Foundation

Past positions

Kadir Has University Associate Professor of Economics; Kadir Has University Assistant Professor of Economics; Mardin Artuklu University Assistant Professor of Economics

Qualifications

PhD Economics, UMass Amherst, 2010

Selected publications

  • “Redistribution Trends in Turkey: Unintended Consequences vs. Deliberate Policies.”.Review of Development Economics (2025) (with D. Eryar).

  • “Is It Merely a Labor Supply Shock? Impact of Syrian Migrants on Local Economies in Turkey.” ILR Review 75 (2022): 741-768 (with D. Cengiz).

  • “A Multidimensional Approach to Gender Gap in Poverty: An Application for Turkey.” Feminist Economics 28 (2022): 119-151 (with B. Akbulut).

  • “Declining Poverty and Inequality in Turkey: The Effect of Social Assistance and Home Ownership.” South European Society and Politics 12 (2018): 547-570.

  • “Women’s Tertiary Education Masks the Gender Wage Gap in Turkey.” Journal of Labor Research 38 (2017): 360-386 (with D.Eryar and . D. Cindoğlu).

article(s)

  • The labor market in Turkey, 2000-2024

    Turkey needs to significantly invest in public care to complement educational compositional change for employment growth

    Hasan Tekguc, September 2025
    In the first two decades of the 2000s, Turkey has relied on structural change from traditional to modern sectors on the one hand and educational compositional change on the other hand to create formal employment in the modern sector. In 2000 the share of formally employed salaried employees in total employment was less than 40% for men and 30% for women. By 2021, this ration converged to 60% for men and women. Formal employment has increased for both men and women and the gender gap in formal employment declined substantially until 2020. However, relying on structural change and education to improve job quality has likely run its course. Since Covid-19, time-related underemployment has increased from virtually zero to 10% of the labor force and wages are stagnating if not declining.
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