1 May not only marks Slovakia entrance to the EU along with other 9 countries in 2004. May Day is also the International Labour Day. Regarding labour force, Slovakia is facing a work force shortage and so entrepreneurs are calling for measures that would make hiring foreigners easier as public STVR informed.
Demographic trends suggest that the situation will continue to worsen. Fewer and fewer people of working age are entering the labour market, while an increasing number are retiring.
While in 2004 there were about 96,000 25-year-olds entering the labour market, last year there were nearly half as many—just under 55,000. Conversely, in 2004 there were more than 41,000 people retiring, and last year that number exceeded 65,000.
Slovakia is facing a shortage of workers in nearly every sector of the national economy. “These include positions in healthcare, such as doctors, psychiatrists, and nurses. The situation is similar in education, for example, school principals or teachers at secondary and elementary schools. There is also a shortage of many technical positions in electrical engineering and energy,” explains Ľubica Melcerová, PR Manager at Alma Career Slovakia.
Companies in Slovakia have long faced a shortage of more than 100,000 employees, and this trend is expected to worsen. That is why it is important for companies that Slovakia relax its rules regarding the entry of workers from non-EU countries.
“It sometimes takes more than six months for a single worker to enter our labor market,” says Martin Hošták, Secretary General of the National Union of Employers.
“There are already 150,000 foreigners working in Slovakia. However, our priority is to ensure that as many Slovak citizens as possible work in Slovakia and on the Slovak labor market,” explains Labour Minister Erik Tomáš.
According to employers, another problem is that more than 350,000 qualified Slovaks are working abroad. Efforts must be made to attract them back to Slovakia.
“The state should strive to make Slovakia a good place to live, so that people want to stay here and don’t remain here only because they have to. Employers should, first and foremost, offer fair wages and ensure decent working conditions,” says economic expert Michal Páleník.
The demographic decline is a problem and an obstacle to further investment for more than 93 percent of companies. “In 2004, the net inflow was roughly 50,000 people, meaning 50,000 more young people entered the labor market than older people retired. Currently, it’s minus 10,000. So 10,000 fewer people are entering the labor market than are retiring,” continues Páleník.
“By 2040, the number of people of working age is expected to decline by more than 11 percent, which amounts to hundreds of thousands of people,” adds Hošták.
The Labour Ministry notes that it supports the creation of new job opportunities in Slovakia, for example, through regular increases in the minimum wage.
Source: STVR
