12 They say that there has been a change in the composition of the labour force over the past  11  See Jonsson and Theobald (2019). 12 See Mojon and Ragot (2019). 8 [24]  ten years. Labour force participation in the age group 55-64 years has tangibly increased, which has slowed down prices and wages. If the compensation levels are lower, employees will have greater incentive to accept lower wages. This will also lead to companies’ costs declining and to price pressures slowing down. If employees’ negotiating strength weakens, their scope to have their wage demands accepted declines. This means lower wages and a downward adjustment in prices. One should not draw any definite conclusions regarding the implications for monetary policy on the basis of these results. While lower price pressures in themselves might justify a more expansionary monetary policy, decisions on the policy rate consist of an overall assessment of various different factors, where developments on the labour market are one such factor. On the other hand, one can say on the basis of these results that supply effects and long-term trends may be important pieces of the puzzle for monetary policy analysis. This is something that has been emphasised in other studies, too. 13  A flatter Phillips curve need not signify less of an impact from monetary policy.
Percentage of those born in Sweden and those born abroad in the labour force, aged 15-74 years. Sources: Eurostat and Statistics Sweden (AKU)  Increased migration in Sweden and abroad During the latter part of the 19th century there was widespread emigration from Sweden to the United States in particular. Around 1.2 million Swedes emigrated to the United States between 1851 and 1930, which at that time was around one fifth of the population. The reasons were in many cases financial, but religious freedom and increased equality were also attractive. There were several factors that enabled emigration. The emergence of the steam ship was one factor. Liberal ideas on economics, politics and freedom – which made a breakthrough around Europe in the 19th century – were other factors. At the beginning of the 20th century, Sweden was an established “emigration country” with more emigrants than immigrants, see Figure 9. This was primarily due to the large-scale emigration, but we also had very few immigrants. In the year 1900 the percentage of people born abroad in relation to the population as a whole was just 0.7 per cent, with most of them coming from other Nordic countries. An interesting fact here is that the immigrants from outside of Europe comprised 90 people from South America, 79 from Africa (56 of whom were from  13 [24]  South Africa) and 87 from Asia.