Any good news? Well, for example, those who are reading this text in the paper version of Hospodářské noviny will probably not lose their job for now. (Not because of this text, but only because of the regional and social composition of the readership.) Other news on unemployment is perdominantly bad.
Not since the summer of 2004 when the unemployment started to be calculated according to a more precise method have the ranks of the unemployed increased so rapidly. It never rose between January and February, on the contrary: February always used to have better results. There should have been two warning graphs in the place of this commentary: 1) the number of job applicants resembles a U-shaped curve, but 2) the number of vacancies in the past two years has changed into the shape of a hockey stick. With the blade pointing upwards: we got used to 100,000 vacancies, now there are 64,000. There are almost seven applicants per one job offer; 60 applicants in the Jesenice area.
The Ministry of Labour has been strenuously trying to show the positive sides. We still have the fifth lowest unemployment rate in the EU, the current number of 428,000 unemployed (7.4%) is still lower than in 2007 (7.7%) and 2006 (9.1%). Yes, sure, we can set down in black and white for the Minister Nečas that it is still better than in the times of Paroubek, Gross and Špidla (in January 2005 there were 561,000 unemployed, which is 9.8%). But these are not the final numbers. It is a trend.
The glassworks in Světlá is going to close down – and the unemployment rate in the Havlíčkův Brod district will rise by one fifth. The situation in this district shows very well what is going on now: The crisis imported from abroad is now affecting even those people who had no shortage of job offers in the past.
There may be good news in this: The high unemployment eventually drop at the same speed as it is now rising. And some more good news: There is one more district differing from the others – Frýdek-Místek with its growing offer of vacancies. Hyundai has just renewed its recruitment of people for the second shift.
