Labour economics

The increase of the minimum wage to BGN 380 is expected to be approved at the meeting of the Council of Ministers on Wednesday.

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Greece's jobless rate fell to 25.7 percent in September from a upwardly revised 26 percent rate in August as the country's six-year recession eases, Greek statistics agency ELSTAT said on Thursday.

September's reading was the lowest since August 2012 when unemployment stood at 25.5 percent. The record high was set in September 2013, when unemployment hit 28 percent.

After Aleksandar Vulin, Serbia's labour minister, said that the government managed to cut unemployment by more than six per cent in a year, experts cautioned that the labour market outlook is not as rosy as he has suggested.

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Wages in developed countries are flatlining and even falling in some places, holding down economic growth after the financial crisis and increasing the risk of deflation, the International Labour Organization said Friday.

BELGRADE - Serbian Minister of Labor, Veteran and Social Affairs Aleksandar Vulin said Tuesday that the implementation of the new Law on Labor has helped reduce the unemployment rate in Serbia from 20.3 to 17.6 percent.

Finance Minister Vladislav Goranov on Sunday backtracked on plans to freeze the minimum wage at its 2014 level in the next year's budget.

Instead, he said he will propose to increase the minimum wage by BGN 40 from its current level of BGN 340 in two steps next year  - to BGN 360 from January 1 and, "in the absence of a major cataclysm," to BGN 380 from the middle of 2015. 

Social Minister and Deputy PM for social policy Ivaylo Kalfin has announced he will join trade unions' calls and insist on increasing the minimum wage by BGN 40.

Kalfin declared Tuesday he considered freezing of minimum income to be dangerous for the economy.

The minimum monthly wage in Bulgaria will remain BGN 340 next year, the head of the interim parliamentary committee on budget and finance Menda Stoyanova told journalists.

By Roula Salourou

The Manpower Organization’s (OAED) offer to subsidize 2,500 employment positions was snapped up by private sector enterprises in just 45 minutes on Tuesday, illustrating companies’ willingness to recruit workers if they can afford them.

Turkey’s unemployment rate increased to double-digit figures in August for the first time since February, the Turkish Statistics Agency (TÜİK) revealed on Nov. 17.

The unemployment rate increased to 10.1 percent in August from 9.8 percent the previous month, in line with slowing economic growth figures.