Report - UNDP Russia

Employers are making full use of themain underemployment mechanisms: parttimework and unpaid or partly paid vacations.By June 2009 as many as 1.2 million peoplewere working part-time and a further 1.2million were on unpaid or partly paid vacation.Current legislation limits scope for employersto impose part-time work or unpaid vacationon employees, so many employers have foundnew ways of using these mechanisms withoutformally violating the Labor Code. The mostpopular approach is preparation ofagreements between employer and employeeon part-time work (used for 52% of all parttimeemployment) or on unpaid/partly paidvacations (used for 73.3% of all applications byemployees for unpaid vacation and proposalsby employers of vacation with partialpayment). So employers are seeking legalmeans to continue applying the Russian modelof labor market flexibility, i.e. keep theworkforce but cut the payroll.Unemployment has a special place inthe system of indicators that describe the labormarket, but the unemployed only became arecognized group in Russia after the end of theSoviet period. Total unemployment, defined asthe ratio of the unemployed to the totaleconomically active population, peaked duringthe 1998 crisis and fell to its minimum in thelast years of economic growth. Registered(official) unemployment in Russia is 3-4 timeslower than real unemployment due tounattractiveness of unemployment benefitschemes and widespread unofficialemployment.Unemployment started to grow from thefirst days of the current crisis (Table 3.4) andTable 3.4Economically active populationYearMonthEconomicallyactivepopulationEmployedOf whichUnemployedmln. %, y-o-y mln. %, y-o-y mln. %, y-o-yUnemployment, %Registeredunemployedmln.%, y-o-yOfficial unemployment, %July 76.3 100.9 72.0 100.9 4.3 100.4 5.7 1.3 89.4 1.7August 76.6 101.0 72.1 100.7 4.5 104.9 5.8 1.3 88.9 1.720092008September 76.4 101.0 71.6 100.4 4.7 111.4 6.2 1.2 88.2 1.6October 76.1 101.1 71.1 100.0 5.0 118.0 6.6 1.2 87.7 1.6November 75.9 101.1 70.6 99.7 5.3 124.6 7.0 1.3 87.1 1.7December 75.5 100.7 69.6 98.9 5.9 128.2 7.8 1.5 98.0 2.0January 75.1 100.3 68.6 98.2 6.5 131.2 8.7 1.7 110.1 2.3February 74.8 100.1 67.8 97.5 7.1 133.5 9.5 2.0 127.8 2.7March 75.2 100.1 68.3 97.3 6.9 140.4 9.2 2.2 141.9 2.9April 75.6 100.2 68.9 97.1 6.7 148.6 8.8 2.3 153.5 3.0May 76.0 100.3 69.5 97.0 6.5 158.4 8.5 2.2 158.3 2.9June 76.1 100.1 69.8 97.2 6.3 149.2 8.3 2.1 160.9 2.8July 76.3 100.0 70.0 97.3 6.3 144.9 8.3 2.1 163.0 2.856National Human Development Report in the Russian Federation 2009