ABSTRACT
This chapter concerns employment, wage-determination and migration, especially to rural Libya. Wages are high in agriculture because the opportunity cost of labor is high in a booming economy where government employment offers attractive wages and conditions of work. The role of labor in relation to economic growth and development has been consistently emphasized in the economic literature, with respect to both the amount and quality of labor force. It seems that labor stability is related to employer's policies and may be improved through the provision of economic incentives. The shortage of unskilled labor for industry is not primarily due to a quantitative deficiency in manpower reserves, since institutional factors affect the allocation of labor as between the private and public sector. Inadequate supplies of labor may be related to more immediate causes: the under-utilization of existing manpower and its inefficient distribution among the various regions of the country or the different sectors of the economy.
