The main initiative in this respect lies in the third ‘headline target’ setting that the number of people at risk of poverty of social exclusion should be reduced by at least 15 million by 2030, of which 5 million should be children. In its Action Plan, the European Commission further draws light to a number of existing and new initiatives aimed at improving social cohesion in the EU. Stepping up the game on poverty reduction Achieving this objective should push EU resources to be most effectively targeted to specific challenges such as youth unemployment in Spain, female participation in Italy, or Roma exclusion in Bulgaria. More importantly, though, the EU as a whole should acknowledge that its highest (job) growth potential largely lies at its periphery. In the next phase, countries already performing well relative to their neighbours should be asked to make a reasonable contribution to the common target. This snapshot points to obvious shortcomings of an aggregate target for the EU as a whole. The employment developments since 2005 also reveal a picture of growing divergence across EU countries. The Commission should specify how it aims to support the build-up of life-long learning capacities and stimulus systems in member states, building on existing (and successful!) targeted schemes such as the Youth Guarantee or the socialisation of promising national schemes such as the individual learning account (ILAs) recently launched in France (Fernandes and Kerneis 2020). To correct this, the Commission should first detail how it intends to help enhance the quality of public employment services in order to improve the ‘matching’ of individuals’ working aspirations with existing and new work opportunities.Īdopting a life-cycle approach to learning has never been more relevant. Additionally, focusing on increasing workers’ participation in training alone could risk shifting all the responsibility in job creation to the supply side (i.e. While this target is surely well-intentioned, the attention dedicated to this dimension alone questions nevertheless why other critical aspects related to human capital development, including care arrangements, working time, work-life balance, or social dialogue, did not attract such level of political ownership – be it through similar targets or, at least, in the updated Social Scoreboard (see below). In its second ‘headline target’, the Commission opted to set a focus on human capacity: At least 60% of all adults should participate in training every year (up from 37% in 2016), bringing the share of adults with basic digital skills up to 80%. Tapping the employment growth potential where it lies Following a decade of reforms from 2000 to 2007, the female employment rate surged from 64% in 2005 to 76% in 2018 while it remained ‘frozen’ at lower levels in other major EU economies such as France or Italy, where reform had stalled (Hemerijck and Huguenot-Noël 2021).įigure 1 Female employment in Western Europe, 2005-2018 Germany’s widely unexpected turn towards ‘active family policy’ facilitating the return of women to the labour market is a good example. Contrary to long-held beliefs, there is now extensive evidence that expanding social provisions in the form of gender empowerment, active labour market policies, or life-long training boosts employment growth. The proposed minimum standards on adequate minimum wages and new rules on working conditions of platform workers show indeed that, at long last, social protection is no longer seen as a drag on jobs and competitiveness. Besides, the Commission’s plan to achieve this goal suggests a return to the concept of ‘social policy as a productive factor’ that the EU institutions promoted at the time of the Amsterdam Treaty. Tapping into the job growth potential of countries long mocked for their ‘inactivity traps’ could bring much welcome welfare and fiscal gains. The pandemic has led to major distortions in the labour market and added debt burden to the public purse. In line with this, the gender employment gap should be halved, and the share of young people not in employment, education or training (NEETs) reduced to 9%, from 12.6% in 2019.Īiming to revive the employment agenda in the EU through concrete targets is a valuable move. The first headline target proposes that the employment rate of the 20-64 be increased to 78%, from 72.5% in 2020. The Action Plan released by the European Commission on 3 March 2021 proposes three headline targets following the principles set out in the 2017 European Pillar of Social Rights (EPSR).
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