In June 1998, a new Civil Servants' Code was presented to the Greek
Parliament, changing civil servants employment conditions in areas such as
grading and disciplinary rules. The Code has received a mixed response from
trade unions.
In the first six months of 1998, collective bargaining in Spain made good
progress, with well over 5 million workers covered by a new or revised
agreement. Wage moderation prevails and some progress has been made in
employment security. However, few agreements have been reached on working
hours.
An agreement on the status of primary school teachers in France was signed on
10 July 1998 by ministers and two trade unions. The deal seeks to end a
long-running dispute about these teachers' career development.
Denmark's early retirement scheme is becoming increasingly popular. In 1997,
30,300 people took early retirement, bringing the overall total at the end of
1997 to some 136,000 - seven out of 10 of the population aged 60-67 years.
With a 7% yearly increase, the number of people on early retirement will
reach some 200,000 persons in 10 years' time (DK9710136N [1]).
The Public Interest Disclosure Act [1] became law in July 1998 and will come
into force in January 1999. It is designed to protect so-called
"whistleblowers": employees who identify a serious wrong being carried out by
their employers and who speak up publicly about it. The issue has gained
growing prominence in the UK during the 1990s in the light of concerns to
promote corporate responsibility. Some researchers see whistleblowing as the
product of an increasingly information-oriented economy, combined with a
growing tendency for employers to demand total loyalty, the result being that
the possibility of "blowing the whistle" has risen while the freedom to do so
has been curtailed.
In June 1998, a collective agreement was signed for workers all over Greece
employed in enterprises providing security services and security systems.
This is the first agreement for the sector, and covers approximately 10,000
workers.
In June 1998, the Spanish Parliament passed a new law to reorganise the
postal service in line with the 1997 EU Directive on postal services. Some
trade unions and the left-wing opposition parties have rejected the
legislation, but other unions have shown a more favourable attitude after
negotiating certain amendments.
After a compromise between the national social partners at the end of March
1998 on measures for school leavers (AT9803175N [1]), the Austrian government
and parliament set to work to thrash out the final legal framework by 10 June
1998. It provides for a series of temporary measures to facilitate the
absorption of 1998 and 1999 school leavers into employment. ATS 500 million
per year has been reserved for subsidies to enterprises and other
organisations providing training and a further ATS 400 million per year for
school-based courses. The number of unemployed school leavers on 15 November
of each year triggers the release of funds. A maximum 4,000 first-time job
seekers are expected to be without employment on 15 November 1998. Of these,
40% are to be absorbed by special providers of apprenticeships, and 60% by
special training courses at vocational schools. Employment and training
projects will have to be launched between 1 November 1998 and 31 December
1999. Three ministries will jointly decide on the applications but they will
be handled and administrated by the Public Employment Service
(Arbeitsmarktservice, AMS). Furthermore, measures prohibiting pupils with a
large number of failures in the first year of certain types of school from
repeating the year have been relaxed. In this way they will be kept in
school, while in 1997 they were forced out on to the labour market. One
estimate by the AMS puts the number at 3,500. The Ministry of Education
(Bundesministerium für Unterricht und kulturelle Angelegenheiten, BMUK) says
that many of them would have left school whether forced to or not.
In July 1998, the French Government announced that the publicly-owned GAN
insurance group is to be sold off to the mutual insurance concern, Groupama.
The trade unions, for the most part, were satisfied with the decision in
favour of what they saw as the "best bidder" in social and employment terms.
In October 1997, the presidents of six German service sector trade unions
signed a general declaration on restructuring the trade union organisations
in the service sector DE9710233F [1]). Five months later, in February 1998,
the six unions published a common draft for a "political platform on the
restructuring of trade union representation of interests in the service
sector" (Politische Plattform zur Neustrukturierung der gewerkschaftlichen
Interessenvertretung im Dienstleistungsbereich) (DE9803256N [2]).
The European Restructuring Monitor (ERM) has reported on the employment impact of large-scale business restructuring since 2002. This publication series include the ERM reports, as well as blogs, articles and working papers on restructuring-related events in the EU27 and Norway.
Eurofound’s European Working Conditions Survey (EWCS) paints a wide-ranging picture of Europe at work across countries, occupations, sectors and age groups. This series consists of findings from the European Working Conditions Telephone Survey (EWCTS) 2021, an extraordinary edition conducted during the COVID-19 pandemic. The survey was first carried out in 1990.
This publication series gathers all overview reports on developments in working life, annual reviews in industrial relations and working conditions produced by Eurofound on the basis of national contributions from the Network of Eurofound Correspondents (NEC). Since 1997, these reports have provided overviews of the latest developments in industrial relations and working conditions across the EU and Norway. The series may include recent ad hoc articles written by members of the NEC.
Eurofound’s work on COVID-19 examines the far-reaching socioeconomic implications of the pandemic across Europe as they continue to impact living and working conditions. A key element of the research is the e-survey, launched in April 2020, with five rounds completed at different stages during 2020, 2021 and 2022. This is complemented by the inclusion of research into the ongoing effects of the pandemic in much of Eurofound’s other areas of work.
Eurofound's representativeness studies are designed to allow the European Commission to identify the ‘management and labour’ whom it must consult under article 154 of the Treaty on the Functioning of the European Union (TFEU). This series consists of studies of the representativeness of employer and worker organisations in various sectors.
This series reports on developments in minimum wage rates across the EU, including how they are set and how they have developed over time in nominal and real terms. The series explores where there are statutory minimum wages or collectively agreed minimum wages in the Member States, as well as minimum wage coverage rates by gender.
The European Working Conditions Survey (EWCS) launched in 1990 and is carried out every five years, with the latest edition in 2015. It provides an overview of trends in working conditions and quality of employment for the last 30 years. It covers issues such as employment status, working time duration and organisation, work organisation, learning and training, physical and psychosocial risk factors, health and safety, work–life balance, worker participation, earnings and financial security, work and health, and most recently also the future of work.
Eurofound’s Flagship report series 'Challenges and prospects in the EU' comprise research reports that contain the key results of multiannual research activities and incorporate findings from different related research projects. Flagship reports are the major output of each of Eurofound’s strategic areas of intervention and have as their objective to contribute to current policy debates.
Eurofound’s European Company Survey (ECS) maps and analyses company policies and practices which can have an impact on smart, sustainable and inclusive growth, as well as the development of social dialogue in companies. This series consists of outputs from the ECS 2019, the fourth edition of the survey. The survey was first carried out in 2004–2005 as the European Survey on Working Time and Work-Life Balance.
This series reports on and updates latest information on the involvement of national social partners in policymaking. The series analyses the involvement of national social partners in the implementation of policy reforms within the framework of social dialogue practices, including their involvement in elaborating the National Reform Programmes (NRPs).
In 2022, the European Semester was streamlined to integrate the Recovery and Resilience Facility (RRF) established on 19 February 2021 (Regulation (EU) 2021/241). While facing the geopolitical and economic challenges triggered by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Member States have been implementing the national Recovery and Resilience Plans (RRPs) for more than one year and around 100 billion euro in RRF funds have already been disbursed.
This report explores the association between skills use and skills strategies and establishment performance, and how other workplace practices, in terms of work organisation, human resources management and employee involvement, can impact on this. It looks at how skills shortages can be addressed, at least in part, by creating an environment in which employees are facilitated and motivated to make better use of the skills they already have. This further supports the business case for a more holistic approach to management.
This paper provides an analytical summary of state of the art academic and policy literature on the impact of climate change and policies to manage transitions to a carbon neutral economy on employment, working conditions, social dialogue and living conditions. It maps the key empirical findings around the impact of climate change and the green transitions on jobs, sectors, regions and countries in Europe, identifying the opportunities and risks that climate change policies bring to European labour markets.
As part of its response to Russia’s war on Ukraine, the EU swiftly activated its Temporary Protection Directive for those fleeing the conflict in Ukraine – enabling displaced persons to settle in the EU and have access to the labour market and basic public services. This policy brief highlights the main barriers encountered by these refugees (over 5 million people to date) when seeking a job and provides suggestions on how to facilitate their integration.
Living and working in Europe, Eurofound’s 2022 yearbook, provides a snapshot of the latest developments in the work and lives of Europeans as explored in the Agency’s research activities over the course of 2022. Eurofound’s research on working and living conditions in Europe provides a bedrock of evidence for input into social policymaking and achieving the Agency’s vision ‘to be Europe’s leading knowledge source for better life and work’.
The term ‘hybrid work’ became popular due to the upsurge of telework during the COVID-19 pandemic. The term has been increasingly used to refer to situations in which (teleworkable) work is performed both from the usual place of work (normally the employer’s premises) and from home (as experienced during the pandemic) or other locations. However, the concept of hybrid work is still blurry, and various meanings are in use. This topical update brings clarity to this concept by exploring available information from recent literature and the Network of Eurofound Correspondents.
Housing affordability is a matter of great concern across the EU. Poor housing affordability leads to housing evictions, housing insecurity, problematic housing costs and housing inadequacy. These problems negatively affect health and well-being, create unequal living conditions and opportunities, and come with healthcare costs, reduced productivity and environmental damage. Private market tenants face particularly large increases in the cost of housing.
With the expansion of telework and different forms of hybrid work as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, it is important for policymakers to consider both the opportunities and the negative consequences that may result. This report will explore potential scenarios for such work. In doing so, it will identify trends and drivers, and predict how they might interact to create particular outcomes and how they are likely to affect workers and businesses. Policy pointers will outline what could be done to facilitate desirable outcomes and to avoid undesirable ones.
Eurofound's annual review of minimum wages reports on the development of statutory and collectively agreed minimum wages across the EU and the processes through which they were set. The focus of this year’s report is on the impact of high inflation on the setting of minimum wage rates. In addition, new figures on the net value of minimum wages are presented, along with the latest policy-relevant research in the EU Member States and Norway.
Building on previous work by Eurofound, this report will investigate intergenerational dynamics over time. During the 2008 double-dip recession, worrying intergenerational divides appeared in many Member States, and while some of the economic and social impact of the COVID-19 pandemic is universal, early data suggests disparities across demographic cohorts. Eurofound will examine how different age groups may have been affected in terms of their health, labour market participation, quality of life and financial needs, both in the short term and in the long term.
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