Jobless rate has shrunk mainly thanks to poorly paid new jobs

The drop in Greece’s unemployment rate appears to have been achieved through the creation of more jobs at low salaries, the Hellenic Federation of Enterprises (SEV) says, noting that the lion’s share of the employment spike is seen in the salary bracket of 501-600 euros per month. The higher the salary, meanwhile, the lower the rate of the increase in employment.

Hellenic Statistical Authority (ELSTAT) figures on Thursday showed that the jobless rate dropped to 18.6 percent in October 2018, from 21 percent in the same month in 2017, and that the number of employed people grew 2.1 percent on an annual basis. A similar increase from 2017 and the years before that is also recorded by the Labor Ministry’s Ergani employment database.

In its monthly economic bulletin, SEV examined the increase in full- and part-time employment last year by processing the Ergani data. It showed a 26 percent expansion in part-time labor compared to four years earlier, and 24 percent of growth in full-time employment from 2014.

SEV particularly highlighted the fact that while employment has been on the rise across all salary brackets, on a general basis the higher the salary is, the smaller the growth rate. This explains the major rise in employment recorded in the 501-600 euros/month bracket.

Wages are relatively stable, as the monthly salary has ranged between 1,020 and 1,060 euros/month since 2014, with a slight increase recorded last year.

The SEV report also estimates that the significant increase in jobs seen in small enterprises could be partly explained by the rise in the number of workers who appear to be employed by more than one business, from 44,800 in 2014 to 88,800 in 2018.