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The Unemployment Rate in Every Region of Europe

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Re: The Unemployment Rate in Every Region of Europe

#91

Post by distances »

ajuc wrote: post #74
Cthulhu_ wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are some people that have just given up on finding a job; they're able and willing to work, but because of reasons they can't find a job. Those might be on the dole, but they might also be able to survive off of a single income. These stats should have a category "wants to work but can't find any, and is not entitled to benefits". Or "Able to work but doesn't need to because rich".

In my country if you are on a dole and the bureau of employment finds a job for you (usually not very nice job) - you have to take it or have a good reason why you can't (health for example). If you don't - you're left on your own. Also, unemployment benefits end after 6 months no matter what.

> Also, unemployment benefits end after 6 months no matter what.

What happens after six months if you don't have family willing to support you? You're on the streets?

Re: The Unemployment Rate in Every Region of Europe

#92

Post by tom_mellior »

hmschreck wrote: post #78
tom_mellior wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> currently not earning their keep, but not actively searching a job (because they are on the dole) will not be unemployed Why? If you are on the dole but without any disability or other commitment, you are considered "available to start work", no? Being available is one of the typical conditions for getting unemployment benefits. > unable to take a job in the next two weeks because the are in a government job market…

This is how the BLS U3 statistic is arrived at. The U3 is the federal-level unemployment figure that is most commonly pointed to. The U3 specifically does not include discouraged workers, those who are underemployed, or those who simply aren't looking. As long as we are comparing apples to apples (i.e., these figures are all indicative of the same basic data with the same restrictions), there's no issue comparing the…

Some countries' job centers put jobless people into bullshit training courses that do nothing for them, but being in a course means you are not counted as "looking"/"available" for a while. Other countries do not do this.

The "same restrictions" apply, but countries in the first category will have fewer "unemployed" people even if they have the same number of discouraged/underemployed/jobless/whatever people.

Is that apples to apples?

Re: The Unemployment Rate in Every Region of Europe

#93

Post by noisymemories »

nkkollaw wrote: post #5

I'd like to add that actual figures for Italy are hard to estimate correctly. Many, many people work under the table, very often pretending that they're still out of work to keep getting the unemployment check.

Given that here in southern Italy they're usually paid 1/5 of their nominal wage, I'm not surprised. A few companies I've worked with would have folded if they had to pay most of their employees what's written on their salaries. Even while working for bigger european/US companies there's always a tacit expectation that you're gonna work twice the time it's actually written in your contract. And I'm not talking just about low-level positions, I've met junior automotive engineers whose actual wage wouldn't go north of 10€/hr.

Re: The Unemployment Rate in Every Region of Europe

#94

Post by macintux »

tom_mellior wrote: post #92
hmschreck wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is how the BLS U3 statistic is arrived at. The U3 is the federal-level unemployment figure that is most commonly pointed to. The U3 specifically does not include discouraged workers, those who are underemployed, or those who simply aren't looking. As long as we are comparing apples to apples (i.e., these figures are all indicative of the same basic data with the same restrictions), there's no issue comparing the…

Some countries' job centers put jobless people into bullshit training courses that do nothing for them, but being in a course means you are not counted as "looking"/"available" for a while. Other countries do not do this. The "same restrictions" apply, but countries in the first category will have fewer "unemployed" people even if they have the same number of discouraged/underemployed/jobless/whatever people. Is that…

> but being in a course means you are not counted as "looking"/"available" for a while

Are there enough people to whom that distinction applies to be more than statistical noise relative to the other regional variations that would have an impact?

Seems like a minor nit to pick in the grand scheme of things.

Re: The Unemployment Rate in Every Region of Europe

#95

Post by krageon »

jdietrich wrote: post #79
pbhjpbhj wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To me minimum wage is great - but why (in UK) does a 24 year old need less than a 25 year old, or indeed deserve less? Why do "apprentices" deserve less than is considered the minimum living wage. Even minimum wage has been corrupted. UBI, or something equally revolutionary, I think will be needed without a major population collapse.

One of the main risks of a minimum wage is suppressing the employment rate of less-skilled, less-experienced workers. If the minimum wage is too high, it's uneconomic to take on staff who don't deliver enough value for the business. The reduced rates for young people and apprentices exist to reduce this stifling effect - without them, you'd make it uneconomic for businesses to take a chance on new employees who might…

If you've never seen any evidence of that, you've not looked very hard: This is what every supermarket does for their filler jobs, and to a lesser extent for their till and other store facing jobs as well. If you're over 18, you have to be very lucky to keep your job (or more realistically, to keep being given work) in such a situation.

Outside of supermarkets this sort of practice is also pretty entrenched in a lot of small-medium IT businesses: They have a sizeable portion of their workforce as trainees or whatever (they may be underpaid legally, so they almost always are) and don't hire them after their time is up (ever, as a rule). New trainees are then cycled into the slots that are now vacant.

Re: The Unemployment Rate in Every Region of Europe

#96

Post by lmm »

tom_mellior wrote: post #92
hmschreck wrote: post #78

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is how the BLS U3 statistic is arrived at. The U3 is the federal-level unemployment figure that is most commonly pointed to. The U3 specifically does not include discouraged workers, those who are underemployed, or those who simply aren't looking. As long as we are comparing apples to apples (i.e., these figures are all indicative of the same basic data with the same restrictions), there's no issue comparing the…

Some countries' job centers put jobless people into bullshit training courses that do nothing for them, but being in a course means you are not counted as "looking"/"available" for a while. Other countries do not do this. The "same restrictions" apply, but countries in the first category will have fewer "unemployed" people even if they have the same number of discouraged/underemployed/jobless/whatever people. Is that…

Yes it is, since those countries allow people to claim unemployment while not looking for work (via a rather silly rigmarole way of doing so, but still). At the sharp end, there are fewer people in that country who want a job (whether because they'll lose their unemployment if they don't get one or otherwise) and can't get it.

Re: The Unemployment Rate in Every Region of Europe

#97

Post by roenxi »

toomanybeersies wrote: post #43
draugadrotten wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The definition of "unemployment" is important here. it An unemployed person is defined by Eurostat, according to the guidelines of the International Labour Organization, as: > someone aged 15 to 74 (in Italy, Spain, the United Kingdom, Iceland, Norway: 16 to 74 years); > without work during the reference week; > available to start work within the next two weeks (or has already found a job to start within the next thr…

That's the standard definition for unemployment. An unemployed person is generally considered to be someone who would want to be employed, but is not. It is meant to be a measurement of the number of people who want jobs, but are unable to get them. There are other measurements for labour force participation, which are usually fairly easy to find, and are a proportion of people who are legally able to work, against t…

It is as good a time as any to wish a pox on all jargon and reflect that a person with no employment is unlikely to be unemployed.

If anyone else is interested, a very light search into the history of when they picked that measure as the standard suggests it has been with us since ~1930. Apparently the nature of complaints hasn't changed much over the years.

[1] davidcard.berkeley.edu/papers/origins-of-unemployment.pdf

Re: The Unemployment Rate in Every Region of Europe

#98

Post by ajuc »

distances wrote: post #91
ajuc wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In my country if you are on a dole and the bureau of employment finds a job for you (usually not very nice job) - you have to take it or have a good reason why you can't (health for example). If you don't - you're left on your own. Also, unemployment benefits end after 6 months no matter what.

> Also, unemployment benefits end after 6 months no matter what. What happens after six months if you don't have family willing to support you? You're on the streets?

There are other social benefits unrelated to employement (for example for kids from poor families, etc), but in principle - yes.

Now it's not so bad, you can find a job if you really want (it might be bad, but it's there). In 90s we had 20% unemployment and almost no social benefits. It was rough.

Re: The Unemployment Rate in Every Region of Europe

#99

Post by anoncoward111 »

distances wrote: post #91
ajuc wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In my country if you are on a dole and the bureau of employment finds a job for you (usually not very nice job) - you have to take it or have a good reason why you can't (health for example). If you don't - you're left on your own. Also, unemployment benefits end after 6 months no matter what.

> Also, unemployment benefits end after 6 months no matter what. What happens after six months if you don't have family willing to support you? You're on the streets?

Quite literally, yes.

Re: The Unemployment Rate in Every Region of Europe

#100

Post by nraynaud »

Cthulhu_ wrote: post #70
netrus wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

German perspective: Wow, what a dramatic shift in Eastern Germany! Maybe it is just a general upwards trend in Germany with little room for improvement in Southern Germany, but it might also be the beginning of the end of Eastern Germany's under performance. I will certainly investigate further.

I think it could do with an extra dimension for eastern Germany, e.g. wages or relative wealth; having low unemployment is good, but if there's a big wage / wealth discrepancy between east and west there's still room for improvement.

That’s the whole debate, by forcing people to take one euro jobs, you lower the unemployment stats while increasing your poverty stats.
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