Why are they running away?! 69% of employees in Albania do not meet their monthly needs, a record in Europe

69% of employees in Albania encounter difficulties in meeting their monthly needs, a percentage that is the highest in Europe and with a big difference from the countries of the European Union.

The findings were published in a recent European Commission report on working conditions and future implications. The survey is conducted once every five years through surveys of 70,000 workers in 36 European countries.

This includes EU member states, the United Kingdom, Norway, Switzerland, Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia and Serbia.

After Albania are ranked the other countries of the Balkans, which in any case have a high difference with Albania. The second country, where employees report that they do not manage to meet their monthly needs, is Kosovo, with 57% of employees, followed by Montenegro, Serbia, North Macedonia at approximately the same levels, and Bosnia and Herzegovina with 54%.

The report measures economic hardship in the working population using a well-established indicator: affordability. The survey asked respondents to rate their family's ability to make ends meet by considering the family's total monthly income from various sources on a six-point scale from "very easy" to "with great difficulty."

Differences varied widely across countries in terms of the percentage of workers struggling to make ends meet, ranging from 5% in Denmark to 69% in Albania, as shown in the chart.

Bulgaria was the EU member state with the highest percentage of workers in economic difficulty, with 42% finding it difficult to make ends meet. Traditionally, in the Nordic countries the percentage of people who find it difficult to make ends meet is very low, while the opposite happens in Eastern Europe.

Across Europe, a high proportion of lone parents were struggling financially, the survey found, with 45% saying they were struggling to make ends meet, and the figure was even higher for single mothers (48%). .

Përqindjet më të larta ishin në mesin e punëtorëve në familjet me më shumë se dy të rritur dhe fëmijë (32%) dhe familje me një person (27%).

Nuk është për t’u habitur që punëtorët më pak të kualifikuar kanë më shumë probleme për të përballuar jetesën: 42% e punëtorëve në profesionet elementare, 36% e punonjësve të shërbimeve dhe shitjeve dhe 32% e operatorëve të uzinës dhe makinerive raportuan vështirësi. Përqindjet në mesin e profesioneve të menaxherëve, teknikëve dhe profesionistëve ishin të gjitha nën 20%.

These findings, according to the report, confirm known patterns, but also emphasize that policymakers should focus on specific groups, such as single parents and workers in low-wage jobs, who are under high financial pressure even under normal circumstances. The pandemic put an additional burden on these groups, for example when they needed to continue working, but had to take on additional tasks such as home schooling and childcare./Monitor