Publications

Europe Day is a celebration of unity, solidarity and harmony. While we may not have had much to celebrate this past year, one thing we can be proud of is how Europe has come together in the face of large-scale challenges and threats, showing that solidarity is the key to resilience and resolve.

Spiralling housing costs are causing despair across the EU. The situation is making people anxious that they will lose their accommodation or become homeless; they may become overburdened financially or forced to live in substandard accommodation; and many young people are unable to leave home. While renters in the private market have faced the largest cost increases and experienced the most problems with quality of accommodation, people with other types of housing tenure are in difficulty as well. Policy actions in line with the European Pillar of Social Rights and availing of Recovery and Resilience Facility (RRF) funds could both address and prevent problems.

The European Commission declared 2023 as the European Year of Skills, stating ‘Helping people get the right skills for quality jobs and helping companies, in particular small and medium enterprises, address skills shortages in the EU is what this year is all about.’

'Women belong in all the places where decisions are made', to borrow from the late Ruth Bader Ginsburg. These decisions are made everywhere and at every level: in the home and at the workplace; in the boardroom and on the shop floor. Which is why it is of such serious concern to see the ongoing deep-rooted gender segregation across Europe, in employment, of course, but more specifically in sectors, in occupations and in roles and responsibilities. On International Women’s Day we tend to take stock of progress for women in all areas, and there had certainly been much progress in Europe in the years prior to the COVID-19 crisis. For instance, employment rates of women had increased, and yet more women than men lost their jobs at the beginning of the pandemic.

Women and frontline workers are most exposed to the risks of adverse social behaviour at work, such as burnout, exhaustion, anxiety and depression. This is according to the European Working Conditions Telephone Survey 2021 (EWCTS). In this data story, we dive into EWCTS data (EU27) to examine the prevalence of adverse social behaviour in the workplace - also known as ‘violence in the workplace’ - and the health and well-being implications it has for those who experience it. 

The COVID-19 pandemic has changed the way we live and work. With the lifting of restrictions across the globe, we are now able to examine the many repercussions on the world of work. In particular, the unique demands of the last few years have shone a harsh spotlight on the pressures brought to bear on different jobs and on certain work environments and the stresses associated with different forms of work. The pandemic has made us reassess so many aspects of our working lives. But has it changed the way we think about job quality – its role in ensuring a good working life and, indeed, a good life in general? The European Working Conditions Telephone Survey (EWCTS), a representative survey of Europe’s workers conducted by Eurofound in 2021, provides some answers.

The dawn of 2022 brought muted optimism to a Europe beginning to emerge from the COVID-19 pandemic, and the progress of vaccination programmes worldwide brought hope. Government and EU support during the pandemic had kept unemployment at bay, averting the widescale collapse of businesses. In step with the EU’s plans for the year, Eurofound’s focus was firmly on a post-pandemic Europe: the recovery and the twin transition to a green and digital economy. All this changed with Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the start of a war of aggression. The EU and its institutions were compelled to respond rapidly.

Europe faces a winter of uncertainty and potentially discontent. The cost of living is rising rapidly and the spectre of recession looms.

Economic concerns are affecting citizens’ trust in institutions. Research by Eurofound has indicated a decrease in trust in national institutions across the European Union – including in governments, healthcare systems and the police.

Lower levels of health, increasing financial pressure and a significant degree of unmet healthcare: these are the findings of the fifth round of the Living, working and COVID-19 e-survey: Living in a new era of uncertainty – a report that presents an overview of responses from over 200,000 people across all five rounds of the e-survey, which took place from spring 2020 to spring 2022.

In this data story, we use the e-survey data to take a closer look at the impact of the pandemic on mental health.

The platform economy is one of those moving targets, which, despite receiving increasing media and policy attention, has proven difficult to regulate. Given the heterogeneity of employment relationships, business models, types of platform work and cross-border issues, this is not surprising. Yet, in recent years, an increasing number of initiatives and court rulings across EU Member States have sought to address the employment rights and working conditions of platform workers.