Labour economics

The number of people who cannot find a job for over a year, has increased, shows data of the National Statistics Institute (NSI).

At the same time, Bulgaria's unemployment rate in Q3 2014 dropped by 10.8% year-on-year, to 368 800 people. More than 60% of them, however, have been unemployed for more than 12 months. Their numbers decreased by 2.3% year-on-year.

KRALJEVO - National Employment Service (NSZ) Director Zoran Martinovic presented in Kraljevo on Thursday the implementation of active employment policy measures and current trends on the Serbian labour market.

The latest survey, which covered the third quarter, shows that the unemployment rate has dropped to below 20 percent, which was the government's goal, Martinovic said.

Greece’s unemployment rate reached 25.9 percent in August, down from 26.1 percent recorded the previous month and 27.8 percent recorded in August, 2013, according to figures released by the Hellenic Statistical Authority, ELSTAT, on Thursday.

One third of 11.7 million young people in Turkey are either unemployed as they have not been able to find a job or they are neither in school nor holding a job As the world and Turkey proceed toward economic shrinkage, it is the young population who is the most anxious about it.

Asen Angelov, Executive Director of Bulgaria's Employment Agency, has underscored the inefficiency of labor market policy, drawing attention to the fact that they have remained unchanged for over eight years and have only had a temporary effect.

The level of youth unemployment in Bulgaria decreases, said Elka Dimitrova, head of the Labour Market Policies department at the Labour and Social Policies Ministry, quoted by BTA.

According to Dimitrova, year-on-year unemployment among people up to 29 years of age has dropped by 5%, to 23%. In her words, this was below the average for the EU.

BELGRADE - The Serbian government adopted a decision to set the minimum labour cost at RSD 121 per work hour in Serbia in 2015, free of taxes and contributions for mandatory social insurance.

By Roula Salourou

Initiatives aimed at boosting employment in Greece – a country with 1.3 million jobless – are proving underfunded and insufficient, according to a report presented by the General Confederation of Greek Labor (GSEE) in Thessaloniki on Thursday.

Bulgarians who work and can determine their working hours are around 24 000 and make up around 1% of the labour force, the National Statistics Institute (NSI) reported.

People who have a fixed start and end of the working day are around 2.4 Million. People with flexible working time with a certain number of days per week, month or another period of time are close to 50 000.

The total hourly labor cost has risen by 3.6% in Q1 2014 compared to the same period of 2013, according to the preliminary data of Bulgaria's National Statistical Institute.

The total hourly labor cost grew by 5.1% in industry, by 1.3% in services and by 4.4% in construction, the NSI reports.