A popular saying goes that employment isn’t a problem but a solution for the middle classes. So what about underemployment then? Well, maybe Switzerland can answer that!
In an age where employment is absolutely critical and often, not only a problem of the developing but also the developed world (or, countries), it appears that Switzerland is dealing with its own kind of problem.
It appears that where it stands at present, then underemployment is the great nadir of one of the world’s most beautiful and truly enigmatic countries.
According to a survey conducted recently across Europe, it turned out that as many as 2,310,000 were unemployed. On top of that, around 3,56,000 were actually underemployed.
This doesn’t mean that they don’t have a form of employment or sustenance. It simply means that the ones that are underemployed do not have as many hours of active employment as they would’ve liked.
That told, it would be a bit of a misnomer to suggest that only those in Switzerland face the complexity of underemployment. The aforementioned survey also threw light on several developed Western European and Central European nations that are facing the precarious situation.
Spain, with 5.6%, followed by Cyprus with 5.4%, and Greece with 5.3% of underemployment are facing a challenging time while the likes of Germany with 2.8%, Italy at 2.6%, and the UK at 4.3% are next in the line.
While 2019 has unfurled these new numbers, it turns out that the overall average underemployment for Europe in 2018 was only 2.8%.
A local European news platform happened to share the following telling statistic:
Underemployment affects women more than men. In Switzerland, the rate of underemployment was 3.6% for men and 10.8% for women. Across the EU it was 2.1% for men and 4.8% for women.
Now, if one were to take into consideration the factor of ‘unemployment’ then it does appear that Switzerland is definitely suffering from some form of work shortage. But how severely is the global economic slowdown- apparently impacting jobs in the otherwise large-sized and stable Automotive, Insurance, Banking and Finance sectors- affecting Switzerland, one is yet to know?
But what is, in fact, known is that the number of women that make up the overall underemployed positions in Europe- it being 299,000 positions- are around 55 percent of women and 45 percent of the male populace. Now what’s expected is a reaction from Switzerland; how can the famous land-locked nation respond to the employment calamity?