Living Standards Measurements Study - Serbia 2002 - 2007

Graph 9.7. Employment and unemployment
rates by age group, LSMS 2007
age
15-24
25-34
35-44
45-54
55- 64
65+
14.0%
0.0%
employment rate
19.2%
37.2%
39.6%
6.7%
67.9%
17.3%
76.6%
11.3%
71.4%
8.9%
unemployment rate
There are notable regional differences in
unemployment rates (ranging from 10.8 percent in
Belgrade to 18.2 percent in South East Serbia). The
differences in the unemployment rate between
people with different levels of education are also
significant; the unemployment rate is lowest, 7.9
percent, among people with college and university
education, and highest among people with
secondary education, 15.4 percent.
9.12. Discouraged unemployed and
the long term unemployed
Long term unemployment is one of the key
indicators. From the social and psychological aspects
this indicator might be even more important than the
overall unemployment rate because it creates a risk of
getting into a hopeless situation, leading to social
isolation and discourages people from looking for a
job. This especially refers to people without
qualifications, older persons (over 50 years of age),
people with disabilities and certain ethnic groups
(especially the Roma).
A particular problem that arises from long-term
unemployment is the fact that knowledge and skills
become obsolete and that people lose working habits
due to not working for a long time. There is a
possibility that such persons will become inactive,
representing a loss of human resources and an
additional burden for social welfare funds. Such
persons are part of the total potential workforce.
According to LFS data, the percentage of
discouraged people in the total potential workforce,
i.e. people who are not looking for a job because they
have lost hope they would ever find one has increased
from 21 percent in 2004 to 34 percent in 2007.
According to LSMS 2007, 75 percent of the
unemployed fall in the category of long-term
unemployed, i.e. people who have been looking for a
job for longer than a year. The largest number of
unemployed people, over one quarter, has been
looking for a job for a period of 2 to 4 years. The LFS
data shows a similar picture.
Regionally, long-term unemployment among the
total unemployed ranges between 70.5 percent in
Belgrade to 81.8 percent in West Serbia. According to
LSMS data, the long-term unemployment rate8F8F9 is 10.8
percent overall.
When it comes to the qualification structure of
the unemployed, over two thirds are people with
secondary education, over one fifth are people with
primary school education, and 11 percent are people
with college and university education.
The unemployed search for work in various
ways. Based on LFS results the most common way of
seeking employment is via the National Employment
Service, as many as 80.7 percent of the unemployed
have tried to find a job in this way. The following
activities are also used as ways of looking for a job:
54.7 percent ask friends, relatives, etc. 34.9 percent
have responded to job advertisements, and 34.7
percent have directly contacted employers. Less than l
10
percent have set up their own businesses.9F9F
According to their previous working
experience, the unemployed are divided into two
categories: people who have been employed before
and people who have never worked. The first
category account for 54.1 percent of the
unemployed, and the majority of them are those left
without a job because their companies were closed
down, liquidated or gone bankrupt (35 percent) or
because they were laid off (21 percent). People who
have never worked before account for 45.9 percent
of the total number of unemployed. The situation
for those looking for employment for the first time
account for 58.9 percent of the unemployed living
below poverty line and 57 percent of the
unemployed who fall within the first quintile of
consumption.
126 Living Standards Measurements Study - Serbia 2002 - 2007