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    [post_date] => 2011-07-05 18:39:13
    [post_date_gmt] => 2011-07-05 16:39:13
    [post_content] => The unemployment figure that was released yesterday was one of the best pieces of news coming out of Spain´s labor market for a long time. But it does not show that Spain´s workers are out of the woods.

According to the Labor Ministry, unemployment fell for the third month in a row at the highest rate observed in some time in Spain, to 4.1m people. The decline was especially significant in the service sector. At the same time, employment rose by 1.15% over the previous year.

Most observers of Spain´s labor market expected the June figure to be good, given the usual rise in hiring in the tourist sector and thanks to the political difficulties that are keeping tourists in Spain rather than other sunny destinations (e.g., Tunisia, Egypt). This effect could last to the beginning of the fall and is clearly good news for Spain.

But yesterday´s figures, when seasonally adjusted, show that unemployment continues to rise and employment to fall in Spain. Of the hirings, an unusually large percentage were part-time and only 7% were given permanent contracts.

These two features show the persistent uncertainty of companies who need workers.

What could clear away this uncertainty would be a decisive move toward labor-market reform. The government should seize the moment, reach a bipartisan consensus and take radical steps. If this is not done, we will return to bad news in October, and the bad news is likely to last.
    [post_title] => No good news yet on unemployment front
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    [post_name] => no-good-news-yet-on-unemployment-front
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    [post_modified] => 2023-12-13 13:43:00
    [post_modified_gmt] => 2023-12-13 12:43:00
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The unemployment figure that was released yesterday was one of the best pieces of news coming out of Spain´s labor market for a long time. But it does not show that Spain´s workers are out of the woods.

Economy Weblog According to the Labor Ministry, unemployment fell for the third month in a row at the highest rate observed in some time in Spain, to 4.1m people. The decline was especially significant in the service sector. At the same time, employment rose by 1.15% over the previous year.

Most observers of Spain´s labor market expected the June figure to be good, given the usual rise in hiring in the tourist sector and thanks to the political difficulties that are keeping tourists in Spain rather than other sunny destinations (e.g., Tunisia, Egypt). This effect could last to the beginning of the fall and is clearly good news for Spain.

But yesterday´s figures, when seasonally adjusted, show that unemployment continues to rise and employment to fall in Spain. Of the hirings, an unusually large percentage were part-time and only 7% were given permanent contracts.

These two features show the persistent uncertainty of companies who need workers.

What could clear away this uncertainty would be a decisive move toward labor-market reform. The government should seize the moment, reach a bipartisan consensus and take radical steps. If this is not done, we will return to bad news in October, and the bad news is likely to last.

WP_Post Object ( [ID] => 7137 [post_author] => 28822 [post_date] => 2010-06-06 12:51:34 [post_date_gmt] => 2010-06-06 10:51:34 [post_content] => Again, the government has pledged to do something within the next days to remove the dysfunction from Spain's labor markets. Again, unions threaten to strike and uncertainty prevails. And nervous markets prepare to give Spain's debt a new beating. What does it take to get this government to see that the situation has gone 'way too far for a simple change in the days of severance pay to change anything? Unemployment is 20%, the debt has been downgraded twice, and analysts obsessed with the perils of the PIGs are looking for major change. At this very late stage of the game, the onnly thing that will make a difference is sweeping reform. Anyone who has watched the agony of Spain's labor markets play itself out once a decade knows what is needed. 1. Lower severance pay and some protection for temporary workers, so that society's demands for security are less of a farse. One possible model: the new dismissal law before the Italian parliament, where there is a single type of contract and every worker accumulates about 20 days per year of severance pay. 2. Crystal-clear conditions for regular dismissal, so that only a tiny minority of cases have any reason to go to court. 3. An overhaul of collective bargaining and even of union financing. If their budget depended on worker contributions, they might begin to actually speak for the concerns of workers. 4. Deep and thorough reform of the unemployment benefits system, to require the jobless to undergo training in order to collect the subsidy. 5. Drastic change in training programs: many, many, many more courses, managed in cooperation with companies in a great public-private partnership to raise Spanish productivity and get 4+ million unemployed back to work. It's a tall order. But the work has been postponed for so long that nothing less will do. [post_title] => Back to the labor market [post_excerpt] => [post_status] => publish [comment_status] => open [ping_status] => open [post_password] => [post_name] => back-to-the-labor-market [to_ping] => [pinged] => [post_modified] => 2023-12-13 13:43:01 [post_modified_gmt] => 2023-12-13 12:43:01 [post_content_filtered] => [post_parent] => 0 [guid] => https://economy.blogs.ie.edu/archives/2010/06/back-to-the-labor-market.php [menu_order] => 0 [post_type] => post [post_mime_type] => [comment_count] => 8 [filter] => raw )

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