Social Europe EU Employment and Social Situation I Quarterly Review September 2012 With special focus on LFS supplementary indicators to unemployment, ensuring sufficient income to lift children out of poverty, social climate across the EU and restructuring support instruments September 2012 I 1 Social Europe EU Employment and Social Situation I Quarterly Review This Quarterly Review provides in-depth analysis of recent labour market developments. It is prepared by the Employment Analysis and Social Analysis Units in DG EMPL. A wide combination of information sources have been used to produce this report, including Eurostat statistics (see [codes] mentioned under the charts, to be used with the Eurostat data search engine: http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/portal/page/portal/statistics/search_database), reports and survey data from the Commission’s Directorate-General for Economic and Financial Affairs, national and sectoral statistics and articles from respected press sources. The Review has also benefited from contributions from public and private employment services. The sections on restructuring trends, based on ERM data, were prepared by the European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions (Eurofound). Contact: [email protected] September 2012 I 2 Social Europe EU Employment and Social Situation I Quarterly Review Table of Contents Executive summary ...................................................................................................... 5 Introduction ................................................................................................................. 9 Macroeconomic and employment context and outlook ................................................. 9 Context ...................................................................................................................... 9 Outlook ..................................................................................................................... 11 Recent labour market and social trends ..................................................................... 13 Employment ............................................................................................................... 13 Unemployment ........................................................................................................... 14 Long-term unemployment......................................................................................... 16 Inactivity and discouragement ...................................................................................... 17 > Special Focus: LFS supplementary indicators to unemployment ..................................... 19 Youth ........................................................................................................................ 23 Other selected groups ................................................................................................. 26 Financial situation of households ................................................................................... 28 Underlying labour market and social developments ................................................... 31 Employment patterns: types of contracts ....................................................................... 31 Vacancies: jobs starters and leavers.............................................................................. 33 Vacancies, labour shortages and hiring activity ............................................................... 34 Productivity, labour costs and hours worked ................................................................... 36 Social inclusion trends ................................................................................................. 38 > Special Focus: Ensuring sufficient income to lift children out of poverty .......................... 38 > Special Focus: The social climate across the EU ........................................................... 43 Impact of restructuring on employment ......................................................................... 47 > Special Focus: Restructuring support instruments database .......................................... 50 Sectoral trends ........................................................................................................... 53 > Sectoral Focus: Tourism and HoReCa sector ................................................................ 56 Latest developments in selected Member States ........................................................ 59 Belgium ..................................................................................................................... 59 Cyprus....................................................................................................................... 60 Czech Republic ........................................................................................................... 61 France ....................................................................................................................... 62 Italy .......................................................................................................................... 63 Lithuania ................................................................................................................... 64 Luxembourg ............................................................................................................... 65 Poland ....................................................................................................................... 66 Annex 1: Selected statistics ....................................................................................... 69 Annex 2: Selected research ........................................................................................ 79 September 2012 I 3 Social Europe EU Employment and Social Situation I Quarterly Review September 2012 I 4 Social Europe EU Employment and Social Situation I Quarterly Review Executive summary The EU Employment and Social Situation Quarterly Review provides an overview of developments in the European labour market and the social situation in the EU, based on the latest available data. Against the backdrop of persistent divergence between the 27 labour markets and a strong tendency towards polarisation, social risks are increasing. In the second quarter of 2012 employment remained broadly stable compared to the previous quarter in the EU (+0.1 %) and the Euro area (0.0 %), after three consecutive quarters of minor but constant decline (-0.1 % q-o-q in the EU, through 2011 q3 – 2012 q1), while the GDP recorded a minor contraction in the second quarter of 2012 (-0.1 % q-o-q in the EU, -0.2 % in the Euro area). However, employment is subdued in comparison with 2011: in the EU employment went down by 0.2 % over the year to the second quarter of 2012, while EU GDP was 0.3 % down compared to the second quarter of 2011. In the Euro area, declines were of 0.6 % and 0.5 % respectively. The EU has been in recession or on the verge of it since late 2011 and the overall economic sentiment is at its lowest level in three years. In this context, job-finding prospects remain poor compared to pre-crisis years. The fall in economic activity stems from further decline in domestic demand, whereas increased exports cushioned it slightly. Economic activity and employment declined further in Spain and Portugal. Greece, Bulgaria and Cyprus have seen fast declines in employment too. Among the largest Member States, the economy continued to grow in Germany, France and Poland, whereas the economy of Italy, Spain and the United Kingdom saw a further contraction. In this context, gross household disposable income declined in two-thirds of EU countries between 2009 and 2011, which explains why the share of the EU population reporting their households are experiencing financial distress remains historically high, having generally edged up further over recent months. Over the last year Italy has recorded a particularly sharp rise in overall financial distress followed by Greece, Ireland, Cyprus, Portugal and Spain. Among households within the lowest income quartile the share of people experiencing financial distress has increased further in the majority of Member States. However, richer households, relatively less affected so far, were more numerous to report having to draw on their savings over the last quarter. Citizens of the countries affected by the steepest income declines are also generally more likely to have negative perceptions of their social situation, as the 2012 Eurobarometer on Social Climate shows (see p. 43). Since last year, significant improvements were noted in Latvia, France and Denmark, while serious declines were seen in Italy, Greece and Cyprus. Child poverty is becoming an issue for a growing number of households. It results from the conjunction of insufficient earnings from parental work and inadequate support to households with children. The size and effectiveness of social expenditure dedicated to children vary considerably across the EU, pointing to potential efficiency gains in spending towards children. Affordable childcare, along with appropriate tax and benefit incentives, is a very important factor in allowing parents, and especially mothers, to work (see p. 38). More worrying is the fact that unemployment is still on the rise and has climbed above 25 million, a historically high level. In July, 25.3 million people (10.4 % of the labour force) were out of work. The continuous increase in unemployment in the