Comparative analysis of job quality and working conditions in the Western Balkans

BACKGROUND

The countries of the Western Balkans are facing manifold economic and social challenges.Less than a decade ago, the Western Balkan countries were considered to be among the countries with the worst labour market statistics. Recently, however, quantitative labour market indicators have significantly improved throughout the region, although they are still well below EU averages. This is where The European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions (Eurofound)’s current engagement, given its mission to provide knowledge to assist in the development of better social, employment and work-related policies, can make a real difference in the Western Balkans. Eurofound has developed three probability-based EU-wide surveys that provide high-quality data: the European Working Conditions Survey (EWCS), the European Quality of Life Survey (EQLS) and the European Company Survey (ECS) and created more recently the Living and Working in the EU e-survey. The 2021 European Working Conditions Telephone Survey (EWCTS) is particularly important since it was conducted amidst the global COVID-19 pandemic, and covered 36 countries (EU27, UK, Switzerland and Norway) as well as six IPA countries, i.e. Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia, and Serbia. It is in this context that Eurofound has contracted FREN and the European Centre to conduct a comparative analysis on job quality and working conditions and draw recommendations for their improvement in the region.