Social Rights Monitor 2019

SOLIDAR Social Rights Monitor 2019 Published in November 2019 © SOLIDAR SOCIAL RIGHTS MONITOR 2019 COUNTRY MONITOR - TABLE OF CONTENTS NOVEMBER 2019 TABLE OF CONTENTS PAGE INTRODUCTION 02 AUSTRIA 09 BULGARIA 15 CROATIA 21 CZECHIA 27 ESTONIA 33 FRANCE 39 GERMANY 45 GREECE 51 HUNGARY 59 ITALY 67 THE NETHERLANDS 79 ROMANIA 85 SLOVAKIA 93 SPAIN 99 THE UNITED KINGDOM 109 SERBIA 119 SOCIAL RIGHTS MONITOR 2019 COUNTRY MONITOR - INTRODUCTION NOVEMBER 2019 Introduction SOLIDAR’s Social Rights Monitor 2019 provides an furthermore under pressure from attacks on the insight into the state of social rights in 16 European work of Civil Society Organisations and restrictions countries: 15 from the European Union – Austria, to the freedom of the press. Bulgaria, Croatia, Czechia, Estonia, France, Ger- The Monitor also analyses to what extend these many, Greece, Hungary, Italy, Romania, Slovakia, aspects are reflected in the Country Specific Spain, The Netherlands, United Kingdom – and one Recommendations of the European Semester candidate country, Serbia. The Monitor assesses process. For the successful implementation of the state of social Europe in terms of equality of the European Pillar of Social Rights and the UN’s opportunities, fair working conditions, social protec- Sustainable Development Goals, it is of utmost tion, inclusion and civic space based on the obser- importance that the policy recommendations of the vations of Civil Society Organisations working on European Commission to the Member States are the ground in combination with statistical data and in line with and conducive of achieving these social scientific findings. We found that although European and sustainable goals. It is therefore worrisome that economies are recovering from the impact of the despite the introduction of the Social Scoreboard, crisis, the social reality paints another picture with the Country Specific Recommendations continue to rising levels of in-work-poverty, increasing social center around macroeconomic indicators and fail to and regional inequalities and precarious work as put Europe’s social objectives at their core. some of the most pressing issues. Civic Space is Gini Index: 30.6 (EU 2017) Unemployment: 6.8% (EU 2018) Gender equality index: 67.4 (EU 2019) Youth unemployment: 14.2% (EU 2019) AROPE: 21.7% (EU 2018) Social welfare spending (as % of GDP): 18.8% (EU 2017) Tax on labour as share of total taxes: 49.7% (EU 2017) In work poverty: 9.2% (EU 2018) SOCIAL RIGHTS MONITOR 2019 COUNTRY MONITOR - INTRODUCTION NOVEMBER 2019 Equal opportunities and fair working ment which subsequently cut it by 22%. conditions SOLIDAR’s National Strategy Groups warn that the work-life balance policies often leave much After the economic crisis, most European countries to be desired. The EU work-life balance directive are now seeing their economies recover. Employ- and its forthcoming implementation will lead to an ment rates are up and unemployment continues improvement of paternity leave in some countries, to decrease. However, this does not mean that the however in practice the responsibility of childcare social situation has returned to its pre-crisis state. as well as care for other family members remains Social inequalities have increased in the ma- primarily on the shoulders of women. Generous jority of European countries. In many countries, maternity provisions, in combination with insufficient unemployment rates are still higher than they accessible childcare infrastructure s and a lack of were before the crisis. The jobs that are being policies that encourage gender equal distribution newly created are furthermore not of the same of care tasks, result in the discrimination of women quality as those that were lost during the crisis. In in the labour market. In all European countries, an attempt to boost employment, some govern- women earn less than men for the same work. ments have diminished employment protection and On average the gender pay gap in the EU is 16%, introduced more flexible forms of work. As a result, however the discrepancy between the wages of employment has become more precarious with women and men vary considerably between coun- short-term contracts, part-time work and bogus tries; from 3.5% in Romania to 20.8% in the United self-employment becoming increasingly common- Kingdom. In the vast majority of countries, we see a place. In the Netherlands, the share of workers prac- positive trend of the gender pay gap slowly decreas- ticing as lone self-employed doubled to 12,3% and ing, from an EU average of 17.1% in 2010. However the number of flex-workers increased by 75% over in some worrying cases, such as Croatia, the pay the past 15 years.1 gap has increased in recent years.4 Working conditions Equal opportunities Working conditions have furthermore deterio- Especially young people are facing difficulties rated. Some of the most striking examples can be in the labour market. This is reflected in above-av- found in Austria where the possibility of a 12-hour erage unemployment rates amongst young Euro- working day has been introduced and in Hungary peans5 and a higher incidence of precarious work where a law commonly referred to as the ‘Slavery for young workers. Many of SOLIDAR’s members Act’ now allows for employees to work a full extra signal that their national education system does day per week in overtime. In addition, wage growth not equip students with the skills they need has stagnated.2 In Spain, the average salary de- to successfully make the transition from school to creased by €800 between 2011 and 2015.3 The cur- work. The Commission’s Country Reports find that tailing of trade unions’ influence on wage setting has there is a general lack of attention to the digital skills been an important contributing factor here. The role needed in the modern labour market. This is also re- of social partners in shaping employment conditions flected in the inadequacy of lifelong learning oppor- and setting wages has in many cases been limited. tunities, which should be expanded to help workers In Greece, for example, the competence of setting adapt to the changing world of work. the minimum wage was reclaimed by the govern- Educational outcomes continue to vary drastically, 3 SOCIAL RIGHTS MONITOR 2019 COUNTRY MONITOR - INTRODUCTION NOVEMBER 2019 not only between countries, but also between re- too easy to conclude that work by definition solves gions and social groups. Educational systems in social problems and lifts people out of poverty. In the Europe tend to perpetuate socioeconomic ine- period from 2010 to 2017, the number of people qualities and only sparingly facilitate social mobility. suffering from in-work-poverty increased, from According to a study by the OECD, a German child 8.3% to 9.4%.11 This is largely the result of low-qual- born in a poor family would take six generations, or ity jobs, involuntary part-time work and bogus 180 years, to reach the average national income.6 self-employment. For children from a Roma or immigrant background education often has much smaller effect in terms of Poverty rates and socioeconomic conditions in gen- improving future prospects. eral do not only vary drastically between countries, many countries also see large discrepancies Migration manifests itself in distinct ways in the var- between different regions. This becomes particu- ious regions of our continent. Eastern and Southern larly apparent in the case of Slovakia; even though European countries - particularly those hit hard by by looking at the GINI index the country seems to be the economic crisis - are faced with outward mi- one of the most equal in Europe, its wealth is largely gration of predominantly young and educated concentrated in the west of the country in the region workers. 75% of young Serbians indicate that they surrounding the capital. The east of the country is are planning or considering to emigrate.7 Similar significantly poorer and faces many socioeconomic numbers are found in Greece8 and Italy9. This brain challenges.12 drain is causing shortages of qualified profession- als, for example in the IT and healthcare sector. Almost all of our National Strategy Groups warn that In the Northern and Western European countries, affordable and quality housing has become migration mainly poses challenges of integrat- less accessible in recent years. Especially in urban ing migrants into both society and the labour centres and some touristic hotspots property prices market. In France for example, people with a migra- and rents have risen sharply. In Czechia, prices for tion background are confronted with discrimination housing have risen by a shocking 23% since the when searching for a job. Overall, employment lev- beginning of 2015.13 Especially in big cities such els tend to be lower for immigrants than for the local Prague and Brno, housing is rapidly becoming the population. The language barrier remains one of the least affordable of the EU.14 biggest obstacles for migrants to access the labour market, social services and health care. CSOs play Although the effect of social transfers on poverty an important role in informal language education reduction varies significantly between countries, and helping migrants navigate the bureaucracy of overall the impact of social transfers has de- accessing social services. creased over the past 15 years.15 Demographic pressures are highlighted by various National Strategy Groups as a challenge for the sustainability Social protection and inclusion of the social welfare system. In some countries this is mainly caused by demographic aging, in others The number of people at risk of poverty or social mass emigration also plays a role. exclusion in the EU has decreased over the last decade to 21.7% in 201810, mainly as a result of Finally, the increasingly flexible nature of work and increased employment rates.

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