Employment and Social Developments: growing divergence and higher risks of long-term exclusion

EU News 2/2013

8 January 2013
IP/13/5
Brussels

After five years of economic crisis and the return of a recession in 2012, unemployment is hitting new peaks not seen for almost twenty years, household incomes have declined and the risk of poverty or exclusion is on the rise, especially in Member States in Southern and Eastern Europe, according to the 2012 edition of the Employment and Social Developments in Europe Review. The impact of the crisis on the social situation has now become more acute as the initial protective effects of lower tax receipts and higher levels of spending on social benefits (so-called "automatic stabilisers") have weakened. A new divide is emerging between countries that seem trapped in a downward spiral of falling output, fast rising unemployment and eroding disposable incomes and those that have so far shown good or at least some resilience. The latter tend to have better-functioning labour markets and more robust welfare systems.

Source and additional information:
http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_IP-13-5_en.htm?locale=en

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