Over a year after the EU accession, Polish economy is at a crossroads. In the next couple of years it will be decided if Poland turns to full account the development opportunity brought about by European integration. The challenges facing the economic policy are related especially to the labour market. The highest unemployment rate and the lowest employment and economic activity rates among the EU member states demonstrate the distance Poland has to traverse not only to achieve the Lisbon Strategy goals and the level of development present in the EU15, but also to draw alongside the other nine new member states.
It is undoubtedly possible to reach the objective of full employment, reduction of unemployment to one-number values, and reduction of poverty threat in a couple of years. To achieve these goals, the emerging positive changes on the Polish labour market should become more dynamic and permanent. The support that strengthens positive transformations in Polish economy and levels its weaknesses must come from the socio-economic policy, and especially – labour market policy. Effective actions can only be undertaken if a comprehensive diagnosis is available, describing the sources of the problems and defining the areas, where the introduction or modification of an existing public intervention will bring the best results.
The Report presents a synthesis of research on the Polish labour market and poses an attempt to enrich the present knowledge concerning the phenomena of Polish unemployment with the results of statistical and econometric analysis conducted on both individual and aggregated LFS data. The Report was written in the Department of Economic Analyses and Forecasts in the Ministry of Economy and Labour. The researchers from the Warsaw School of Economics made a significant contribution to this Report as well.
The Report is composed of four parts. The first one offers a detailed analysis of the reasons of the rapid decrease in employment and increase in unemployment at the turn of 1998-1999. It also examines the high persistence of the consequences derived from these changes in the following years. The second part focuses on the structural characteristics influencing the mismatches between labour demand and labour supply. The third part includes a detailed analysis of the role played by the Polish educational system in the accumulation of the human capital by young people, and the evaluation of the life-long learning system, which creates opportunities of complementing the knowledge attained in the process of formal education by the individuals over 24. In the fourth part, the focus is on the influence the most important elements of institutional setting of the Polish labour market have on unemployment, employment, and economic activity.
