Has the natural rate of unemployment decreased with modern travel and the Internet?
The natural rate of unemployment is a combination of structural unemployment and frictional unemployment. Structural unemployment is caused by a surplus of labor at a given wage in a given area. Frictional unemployment is caused by workers searching for or transitioning between jobs. However, modern travel (airplanes, automobiles, etc.) would reduce structural unemployment and frictional unemployment by allowing for faster movement of excess labor to transfer to areas with a shortage of labor; similarly, the Internet (specifically search engines, online jobs fairs, etc.) would reduce frictional unemployment by allowing for workers to search for and find jobs more easily. Does this imply that the natural rate of employment decreased with modern travel and the Internet?
Natural employment rate hasn't necessarily decreased due to modern travel because we would have to figure out the movement of labor across borders to see if there is a net loss (outflow) or net gain (inflow) of labor based on immigration and migration. Furthermore, if you factor the internet as modern "transportation", we would have to figure out the impact of work created and destroyed by the internet and associated services. You have to understand and to the best of your ability quantify the effects of these forces and see if the data supports your hypothesis.
