GENDER AND AGE ISSUES What is more, those actually employed are more likely to be men (64.4 percent of men are active on the labor market according to GUS data) than women (48.1 percent). The European Commission’s data for working-age population paints an even darker picture: in the European Semester report for Poland it was pointed out that 79.3 percent of Polish men aged 20-64 were employed, with just 65.1 percent of the corresponding group of women. Kulesa believes that employers will soon have to start including older staff in their perspective. The over-55 population is growing while the availability of young people declines. Yet another challenge for employers is the Z generation, which is hardly loyal to companies they work in. These young people also prefer more flexible working conditions. It will also be a challenge for employers to change the way they think about their work culture so that people feel more comfortable and more stable at work, Kulesa said. In her opinion, there are already companies open to such changes, yet an old style of work management still dominates in Poland. Changing it will be hard for both employers and employees. Companies seem to be unaware that changes may also bring profits in a financial sense. HOW TO FIND THEM? Tyrowicz also argues that there is a large number of people available for work. “Employers usually complain about insufficient skills, excessive wage expectations and too few workers. There is nothing wrong about those complaints, but I would be cautious in interpreting those complaints as actual measures of labor market situation,” she said.
Average monthly gross wages (seasonally adjusted), PLN
5090,69
5123,33
5138,50
April 2019
May 2019
June 2019
4975,70 December 2018
5055,26
4962,01 November 2018
March 2019
4935,35 October 2018
5045,04
4902,81 September 2018
February 2019
4873,67 August 2018
5015,52
4848,19 July 2018
January 2019
4830,22
Source: GUS
June 2018
WHY WORK AT ALL? These comments may sound strange in a country where employers, especially those active in the construction, manufacturing and IT sectors, complain about a shortage of workers. However, Tyrowicz explained that labor shortage is not the right diagnosis. Currently, about 10 percent of Poland’s potential labor force remains outside the labor market. The main barrier for those individuals to work is flexibility in terms of working hours and part-time rather than fulltime employment opportunities. While the skills of those who remain outside the labor market may be perfectly matched with the needs of employers, the potential workers and the employers do not even enter negotiations to cooperate, because the employers do not offer positions which respect the need of the workers to combine their professional and private lives. Part of the problem is also that for lower paid jobs, part-time employment results in low total compensation, which reduces incentives to even start working. Economically inactive people comprised 44.1 percent of the total population above the age of 15 in the first quarter of 2019, slightly more than in Q1 2018, GUS data shows. Within that group, 54.6 percent were pensioners and 16.4 percent were students. In the case of working-age people (defined in Poland as aged 18 to 59 for women and 64 for men) neither working nor seeking a job, the most often mentioned reasons were family duties (31.9 percent), disease or disability (25 percent) and further education (24.4 percent).
Within the group of potential workers not currently entering the labor force, women are naturally the largest group, but gender is not the defining characteristic. The individuals forced out of the current labor market require flexible hours for a variety of reasons: caring for a family member, a partial physical disability or mental disabilities. With today’s state of automation and use of robots, it should not be a problem to employ people with a broad range of disabilities. If we compare the number of hours worked, it would seem that a Polish person with a disability is 17 times more disabled than a peer in the Netherlands. This is obviously absurd and shows how little we have done to create an inclusive labor market, Tyrowicz said. In her opinion, the required solution is not to change the labor code, which in Poland is strict, yet easily circumvented by employers. For an efficient labor market, it is fundamental to have efficient job counseling services. Ten years ago I would have said the same. Companies do not know how to find employees because there are no available services in that regard, Tyrowicz concluded. This shortage is not provided for by existing temporary job agencies or existing brokers, which are rather bulletin boards. The rules are simple: a professional job brokering and counseling service available broadly and free of charge to workers, at some fee to employers. Such services exist in different forms and rely on different technologies in the Netherlands, France, Belgium, the US or Germany. There is no need to reinvent the wheel, the economist said.
W B J AUGUST/SEPTEMBER 2019
37
