Member States made progress in many social areas, according to the 2019 Joint Employment Report published by the General Secretariat of the Council on Monday 25 February, which is expected to be adopted at the ‘Employment and Social Policy’ Council in March.
"In a context of improving labour markets and declining poverty, all 14 headline indicators of the Social Scoreboard recorded an improvement over the last year, on average across the EU", notes the report, which has been made public on the Austrian Parliament's website.
More specifically, in the third quarter of 2018, 219.3 million Europeans had a job, 15 million more than in mid-2013, according to the report, noting that the employment rate for 20-64 year olds was 73.2%, which would make it possible to meet the objectives of the EUROPE 2020 strategy (75%).
The unemployment rate (6.8% at the European level and 8.1% in the euro zone) has returned to its pre-crisis level, although wide disparities exist (Greece, Spain, Italy and Croatia are still in a "critical" situation). The report notes that hourly volume is progressing more slowly than job creation, meaning that the reduction in the hourly volume worked per person that began 20 years ago is continuing.
Household income is increasing in almost all Member States and very strongly in the "new" Member States of the Union. However, in a number of Member States (Greece), real gross disposable income per capita remains "significantly" below pre-crisis levels. Most importantly, the study adds that aggregate household incomes have grown more slowly than GDP. This shows that “income gains from the recovery have reached households only to some extent - thus raising questions about the inclusiveness of recent growth”, the report comments.
Overall, the wage framework has improved due to the increase in the level of minimum wages in several Member States, but the real level of wages remains below productivity in most Member States. In nine Member States (Belgium, Croatia, Cyprus, Finland, Greece, Italy, the Netherlands, Portugal and Spain), wage growth was negative.
To view the report: https://bit.ly/2SqXD8K. (Original version in French by Pascal Hansens)