April 1, 2023 - The unemployment rate in the eurozone remained stable in February, and in Croatia it fell slightly, moving away from the average in the zone of application of the common European currency, a Eurostat report showed. Croatia employment rate is now similar to Slovakia's, according to the report.

As Index writes, in the 20-member eurozone, the unemployment rate measured by the methodology of the International Labor Organization (ILO) was 6.6 percent in February, remaining at the level of the previous month, according to revised data from the European Statistical Office.

In the EU, it was six percent, slipping by 0.1 percentage point compared to January. For the sake of comparison, in February 2022 it reached 6.8 percent in the eurozone, and 6.2 percent in the EU.

Eurostat estimates that there were 13.12 million unemployed in the EU in the second month of this year, of which 11.142 million were in the eurozone.

A comparison with January shows that the number of unemployed in the EU decreased by 24,000, and in the Eurozone by 59,000. On an annual level, their number decreased by 257 thousand in the Eurozone and by 247 thousand in the EU.

Croatia next to Lithuania

Spain and Greece are still the only ones with a double-digit unemployment rate, which reached 12.8 and 11.4 percent respectively in February.

In Croatia, the unemployment rate measured by the ILO methodology was 6.3 percent in February, sliding from 6.5 percent in January. In February 2022, it was 6.6 percent.

According to Eurostat data, 114,000 citizens were unemployed in Croatia in February, four thousand less than in the previous month, according to revised data. Compared to the same month last year, their number decreased by six thousand, the tables show.

The closest to Croatia in February was Lithuania with an unemployment rate of 6.5 percent. Slovakia is also close, where it was six percent.

The Czech Republic had by far the lowest unemployment rate in February, at 2.4 percent, followed by Poland with 2.8 percent and Germany with 2.9 percent. Malta and Slovenia are close, with an unemployment rate of three and 3.2 percent, respectively.

Stable youth unemployment

The unemployment rate of citizens under the age of 25 in February in the eurozone was 14.4 percent, the same as in the previous month.

In the EU, it increased by 0.1 percentage point on a monthly basis, to 14.5 percent. In February of last year, it was 14.2 percent in both areas, Eurostat tables show.

The statistical office estimates that 2,799 million young people were unemployed in the EU in February, of which 2,283 million were in the eurozone.

The number of unemployed young people in the eurozone in February was thus 125,000 higher than in the same period in 2022, and in the EU by 173,000, Eurostat announced.

Four countries above 20 percent

Greece had the highest youth unemployment rate in February, at 29.7 percent. Spain follows with 29.3 percent, Italy with 22.4 percent and Sweden with 22.2 percent. Slovakia is very close to them with a rate of 19.9 percent.

Among the EU countries with data available to Eurostat, Germany had the lowest youth unemployment rate in February, at 5.7 percent. The Czech Republic followed with 7.2 percent and the Netherlands with 7.8 percent.

Croatia, Belgium, Cyprus, Romania and Slovenia are not obliged to submit monthly data on unemployment, but submit them on a quarterly basis.

In the fourth quarter of last year, Croatia recorded an unemployment rate of 18 percent in that age group, with 27,000 young people without a job, confirmed the latest Eurostat table of revised figures from the report published last month.

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January 9, 2023 - Work Croatia: a four-day work week is the desire of a growing number of young people in Croatia who strive to balance work and private life, while employers say that there are no legal obstacles to its introduction. Trade unions warn to be careful and avoid the ten-hour workday.

As Index writes, in the four-day organisation of the working week, employees work eight hours on four days while receiving wages for five days. The number of working hours per week is therefore reduced from 40 to 32.

The idea of shortening the working week is not so new, and the pioneer, as in many other industrial solutions, was Henry Ford.

In 1926, he shortened the working week in his factories from six to five days. Ford realized that if a worker has a weekend, i.e., two days off, they would want to buy a car to go somewhere. He realized that people need more time to spend the money they earn, and he wanted to sell as many cars as possible to his workers.

The eight-hour workday became a practice in the 1940s

Although many thought such a move would reduce productivity, the opposite happened. Workers have shown greater productivity and loyalty than before.

Ford's move reverberated across America and sparked many strikes in which workers demanded a five-day work week.

Since the early 1940s, the eight-hour workday and 40-hour work week have become standard practice in various industries worldwide.

This will take decades, but due to the progress of technology, and recently the pandemic and working from home, as well as the abandonment of overtime by millennials and generation Z, the idea of further shortening the work week is starting to gain momentum. In some countries and industries, the lack of workers also forces employers to shorten the working week.

Croatian trade unionists: Strive for a balance between private life and work

The four-day work week is also being discussed in Croatia. A lot of companies have introduced working from home, and most of them are in the IT sector, which allows more work flexibility compared to other industries.

The president of the Independent Croatian Trade Unions, Krešimir Sever, warns that the four-day work week should not be organized into four days of ten working hours.

"After a ten-hour working day, the worker does not have time for anything else in that working day," says Sever for Hina and points out that the implementation of the four-day working week would only be good if the working hours were shortened from 40 to 32 hours, but he claims that this would be difficult to do in Croatia.

"Employers would not react well because even now they complain when we advocate reducing working hours," he says.

One should strive for a balance between private life and work because a well-rested man who has time for himself in addition to his work will probably refuse other people's job offers or if they offer a raise, according to Sever.

Employers: There is no formal obstacle

The Croatian Employers'  Association (HUP) says that the introduction of a four-day work week has long been allowed, but the Labor Act defines a full working week as 40 hours, and the employer can divide it into four, five, or six days.

If the employer wants to introduce a four-day work week, they say there are no obstacles to that.

"If there is an agreement between the employee and the employer to work 35 hours a week, or four days a week, there is no reason to prevent such work organization by legal provisions; however, the same should apply to the agreement if there is an interest of both parties, to work even more working hours than 'prescribed'", they say from HUP.

They note that the pandemic accelerated digitalization and brought significant changes in work organization, such as remote work, and a greater understanding of the balance between private life and work.

The development of technology has brought platform work, job or employee sharing, casual work, or voucher work. All these forms of work are a reality, and should not be administratively restricted, says the HUP.

"At the same time, we face a significant labor shortage, primarily due to demographic processes. In such a situation, it is necessary to enable significantly greater flexibility for workers and employers," they said.

HUP: Croats actually work 37.5 hours a week

That is why HUP insists on adopting new legal solutions that will reflect the actual situation in the labor market.

Since Croatia is oriented towards tourism, employers say it is difficult to shorten the working week due to the smaller workforce.

"All this, of course, should not prevent companies that realize a shift in productivity and can offer more flexible working conditions to reduce the number of working days and thus invest in the satisfaction of their employees," they say in HUP.

They note that in Croatia, the daily break is included in the working hours, which is not the case in most other EU countries, so Croats actually currently formally work 37.5 hours a week.

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ZAGREB, April 7, 2020 - The number of policyholders with the Croatian Pension Insurance Fund (HZMO) fell in March from the previous month, indicating that the crisis caused by the coronavirus epidemic has resulted in lay-offs and that employers did not hire seasonal workers as in the previous years.

The number of policyholders decreased by 12,423, or 0.8%, to 1,529,905. The largest monthly decrease, of 6.4%, was recorded in the tourism and hospitality industry.

The number of insured persons also fell in other important categories, including the manufacturing industry (-0.3%) and trade (-0.9%).

"Despite the pre-crisis expectations that the start of the spring months and the Easter holidays, influenced by seasonal factors, will formally mark the start of the tourist (pre)season and the simultaneous rise in the number of policyholders, the monthly fall in the total number of policy holders reflects the first obstacles and difficulties that the coronavirus pandemic has brought to the Croatian labour market," Raiffeisen Bank (RBA) said in an analysis of the HZMO data.

RBA analysts expect that the usual seasonal trends relating to the tourist season will be weaker than in the previous years.

Compared with March 2019, the number of policyholders increased by 8,646 or 0.6%. The increase was mainly driven by increases in the number of policyholders from the information and communications industry (+7.4%), construction (+5.8%), and professional, scientific and technical activities (+3.9%).

On the other hand, decreases were recorded in the manufacturing industry (-1.3%) and tourism and hospitality (-8.4%).

More coronavirus news can be found in the Lifestyle section.

ZAGREB, March 11, 2020 - The pace of hiring in the European Union accelerated in the fourth quarter of 2019 both on the quarter and on the year, with the same trend being recorded in Croatia, Eurostat said in its revised estimate on Tuesday.

In the fourth quarter of 2019, the number of employed persons in the 27-member bloc rose by 0.3% from the previous quarter, following an increase of 0.1% in the third quarter. This raised the initial estimate for last year's final quarter by 0.1 percentage point.

Year-on-year, the number of employed persons increased by 1%, which is 0.1 percentage point more than Eurostat's February estimate. In the third quarter, the number of employed persons went up by 0.9%.

In Croatia the number of employed persons in Q4 increased by 0.7% on the quarter. Compared with an increase of 0.5% in the third quarter, this points to a slightly accelerated pace of hiring. On an annual level, it rose by 1.9% in the fourth quarter after going up 0.9% in the third quarter.

In 2019, the number of employed persons in the EU went up by 1%, following a 1.4% increase in 2018.

In the fourth quarter, a total of 209.3 million citizens were employed in the EU, which is the highest number of employed persons since Eurostat started publishing data. It is by 15.1 million higher than the lowest number of employed persons in the EU recorded in the post-crisis period in Q1 2013.

More economic news can be found in the Business section.

ZAGREB, February 23, 2020 - Last year the Croatian Employment Bureau (HZZ) provided HRK 446 million (€60m) in aid for self-employment, benefiting 8,723 people.

Self-employment grants, financed by the state budget, the European Social Fund and the Youth Employment Initiative, are part of the HZZ's active employment policy measures. They are intended for starting sole proprietorships, limited liability companies, simple limited liability companies and cooperatives.

Between 2010 and 2019, a total of HRK 1.25 billion (€169m) was granted for promoting self-employment, covering 32,793 persons, the HZZ told Hina.

In 2019, grants were mostly awarded for professional, research and technical activities, construction, manufacturing, information and communications, and various services such as hairdressing, repair of computers and personal and household goods, and dry cleaning.

Last year the maximum amount payable for self-employment was HRK 70,000 (€9,500), plus an additional 15,000 (€2,000) for training or on-the-job training, while this year the maximum amount is HRK 100,000 (€13,500), plus an additional 10,000 (€1,350) for on-the-job training.

More economy news can be found in the Business section.

ZAGREB, February 7, 2020 - The government on Thursday sent to the parliament a bill on foreigners with new regulations on their employment in Croatia, and the government will no longer have the duty to set quotas for the employment of foreign nationals.

Under the bill, employers shall contact the Croatian Employment Service (HZZ) when planning to recruit new workers, and the HZZ will provide them with its opinion after testing the labour market.

If it is established that there are no jobless people registered with the HZZ with the qualifications specified in the request submitted by the employer, the HZZ will give a green light for hiring foreigners. After that, the employer concerned can submit a request to the relevant police stations to issue permits for the employment and stay of foreigners, Interior Minister Davor Božinović said at the government's session.

Under the bill, the issuance of a permit can take 45 days at the most, and in the case of professions and occupations in high demand the procedure should not take more than 15 days, while requests for seasonal employment should be granted in 10 days' time.

The HZZ is also supposed to define the cases that do not require testing the labour market before recruitment.

The new legislation will also introduce the institute of long-term residents who are non-EU citizens.

Also, rules for the temporary or long-term stay of foreign nationals of the Croat ethnic background will be relaxed.

More employment news can be found in the Business section.

ZAGREB, February 3, 2020 - It is only this year that the employment rate in Croatia could reach the level of the pre-crisis 2008, when 1.6 million workers had a job and paid contributions, the Večernji List daily of Monday reports.

The job offer is generally the scarcest in the winter months, but the market is waking up already in February, when demand for workers in agriculture, construction and tourism starts growing.

Currently 19,000 job vacancies are advertised by the national employment office, and the Ministry of the Interior's Department for Aliens in January received around 4,500 applications for work permits for foreign nationals, the daily says.

Most applications, around 3,000, refer to jobs in the construction sector, while around 700 applications are for jobs in the tourism sector. This year, around 100,000 foreign nationals could be working in Croatia. Since the labour pool in neighbouring countries is decreasing, a growing number of workers are arriving from Asia.

In February around 139,000 unemployed persons were registered with the national employment office and if the demand for workers remains the same as last year, when around 150,000 people found employment through the employment office, many of whom found temporary jobs, the official unemployment figures could fall below 100,000 by the summer.

Around 37,000 of the unemployed are people aged under 29 and they are likely to find a job more easily. Around 46,000 jobless are people who have been unemployed for a long time, says the daily.

More employment news can be found in the Business section.

As Ljubica Gataric/VL/Poslovni Dnevnik writes on the 18th of November, 2019, about 66,000 workers were hired to start new jobs in Croatia during September, including about 7,400 first-time job seekers. In the second quarter, 29,000 unemployed people found jobs in the Republic of Croatia, but alongside that, 15,000 workers went to sign on at the job centre during the same time period.

In line with the unfortunate seasonal nature of Croatia's economy, the autumn and winter months bring much fewer jobs, as has been clearly evidenced by the number of job seekers officially registered.

The number of unemployed people is around 125,000, and they can choose from 11,000 job vacancies in total. As a rule, the big move towards ''signing on'' at the job centre typically occurs in October, and this year around 83,000 employees remained without employment in September, and this of course sounds tragic, but like every year, it mostly regards those who were working seasonal jobs.

Eurostat has released the results of a new European labour market survey showing that between the first and second quarters of 2019, three million people (one fifth of all unemployed in the first quarter of 2019) found a job. However, during that same period, 8.3 million former employees ended up out of work and a further 3.3 million became otherwise economically inactive.

The survey does not contain data for Germany, but Croatia is included. According to this data, in the second quarter of 2019, 29,000 unemployed people found a job in Croatia, but in that same period, 15,000 workers registered as job seekers. Another 20,000 ex workers became economically inactive.

Compared to 2018 or 2017, the number of unemployed people finding a job in Croatia halved in the second quarter, traditionally the strongest quarter in terms of new employment due to the boom in agriculture, construction and tourism. In 2018, 63,000 unemployed people were employed in Croatia during this period, and about 56,000 were back in 2017.

As job offers aren't declining, obviously working exhausting seasonal jobs is not a solution for the existing group of unemployed individuals, 47,000 of whom are registered as long-term unemployed. Compared to others, Croatia has a very low employment rate for young highly educated people. At the EU level, 82 out of 100 graduates are employed. In the statistical region of the Adriatic Croatia, employment of young people with higher education levels is only 57 percent, while in the continental part of the country, job opportunities for those with higher education are much better and 72 percent find employment within three years of graduation.

Eurostat states that in addition to the unemployed from the official register, another 22,000 economically inactive workers in the second quarter were employed in Croatia, these people weren't registered as unemployed but were clearly interested in getting job when one was available to them. A year earlier, 27,000 people went into employment during the same period. In the third quarter, 45,000 economically inactive people got jobs last year. All this shows that people do want to work if given the opportunity to do so.

Among the 10 most sought after jobs currently offered, those in the low-paying service sectors continue to dominate.

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ZAGREB, November 11, 2019 - Two-thirds of respondents believe the most important thing when choosing a job are good interpersonal relations, followed by pay and working hours, according to the findings of a survey conducted by the MojPosao job-seeking website.

More than 1,000 respondents took part in the survey aimed at establishing the situation on the labour market. Fifty-one percent were employed, 43% jobless and 6% still in school.

Interpersonal relations are crucial when choosing a job for 69% of respondents, pay is of paramount importance to 62% and working hours to 46% of those interviewed.

Fifty-four percent believe knowledge and skills have the biggest impact on the chance of getting a job, while 20% believe it is work experience, 8% say luck is important and 6% believe good contacts and who you know is crucial.

Only 3% believe the degree of education is a decisive factor, while 2% believe that being a member of a political party plays a key role in getting a job.

Seventy percent of respondents plan to change their job in the next year, more than in a survey conducted in 2012 (52%). In 2012, 52% of respondents were afraid of losing their job, compared to only 18% now.

Sixty-four percent of respondents have been jobless over the past three months, 12% over the past three to six months and 7% over the past five years or longer.

Sixty-two percent are looking for any job, while 28% want a job only in their profession.

Forty-one percent who are still in school expect to look for a job less than three months after finishing school, 19% expect to find it in less than a month and 18% hope to find a job within six months of finishing school.

More business news can be found in the dedicated section.

ZAGREB, October 22, 2019 - A total of 1.56 million people in Croatia were gainfully employed at the end of September 2019, which is 10,899 persons or 0.7% fewer than in the previous month, while the registered unemployment rate fell to 6.7% from 6.8% in August, according to data from the National Bureau of Statistics (DZS).

Compared with September 2018, the number of people in work was 0.9% higher.

Data from the Croatian Employment Service (HZZ) show 112,376 people were registered with the HZZ at the end of September 2019, down by 1.9% from August 2019 and by 13.9% from September 2018.

The registered unemployment rate, calculated as a share of unemployed people in the total active population, was 6.7% in September, compared with 6.8% in August.

The volume of construction work carried out in Croatia in August 2019 was 3.5% higher than in August 2018 and 1.1% lower than in July 2019, the National Bureau of Statistics (DZS) says.

The volume of construction work on buildings increased by 4% year on year, while the volume of work on other civil engineering structures, such as roads, railways, pipelines, dams and sporting grounds, rose by 2.6%.

Compared with July 2019, construction work fell by 0.4% on buildings and by 2.6% on other structures.

More economic news can be found in the Business section.