Social Issues
-
13 January 201216Die Tageszeitung Berlin
-
Employment
A two-speed Europe
5 January 20123PresseuropLa Tribune -
Lithuania
Nurses go Norway
20 December 20111Lietuvos Rytas Vilnius -
10 November 20113PresseuropTimpul
-
Employment
The dream of a flexible labour market
19 October 201116De Volkskrant Amsterdam -
Occupy Protests
Educated, poor and in revolt
17 October 20114PresseuropFrankfurter Rundschau -
EUROPEAN OF THE WEEK
Guido Strack – the downfall of a whistleblower
6 October 201110Süddeutsche Zeitung Munich -
Solidarity
Countries cutting off Europe’s poor
21 September 20119La Libre Belgique Brussels -
Economic crisis
Youthful members of the full-time precariat
15 September 20114Polityka Warsaw -
United Kingdom
Cameron quizzes EU work directive
6 September 2011PresseuropThe Daily Telegraph -
Economic crisis
Please tax me, I’m fabulously rich
30 August 20111The Guardian London -
Social unrest
The street bankers
11 August 20115Der Standard Vienna -
10 August 20111PresseuropLa Razón
-
3 August 2011PresseuropRomânia libera
-
19 July 2011The New York Times New York
-
Austerity
Belt tightening general across Europe
1 July 20111PresseuropPúblico -
Food poverty
EU cuts funding to the poor
1 July 20111PresseuropLe Soir -
United Kingdom
Politicians united against mass strikes
29 June 2011PresseuropThe Independent -
27 June 2011PresseuropPolitiken
-
Luxembourg
Euro-demonstration against austerity
22 June 20111PresseuropLa Voix du Luxembourg -
Czech Republic
"Social Armageddon" in Prague
17 June 20112PresseuropLidové noviny -
Czech Republic
Prague paralysed by transport strike
16 June 2011PresseuropHospodářské noviny -
United Kingdom
The summer, autumn, winter of discontent
14 June 2011PresseuropThe Times -
Unemployment
Italy's youth population in total slump
18 May 20113PresseuropCorriere della Sera -
Romania
Hounding the black economy
9 May 2011PresseuropEvenimentul zilei -
Germany
Not so poor kids
6 May 2011PresseuropFinancial Times Deutschland -
Labour market
Work in Germany? Yes, maybe
29 April 20111Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung Frankfurt -
Spain
Amnesty for moonlighting
26 April 2011PresseuropLa Vanguardia -
23 March 2011PresseuropLe Soir
-
Romania
Who's afraid of new labour code?
17 March 20111PresseuropGandul -
Portugal
Interns to be paid even less
1 March 2011Presseuropi -
7 February 2011PresseuropRzeczpospolita
-
2 February 2011PresseuropDnevnik
-
28 January 20111PresseuropABC
-
Employment
Come back to Germany, Pepe
24 January 20112La Vanguardia Barcelona -
11 January 2011PresseuropCorriere della Sera
-
5 January 2011PresseuropABC
-
Austerity
Hard-up families in affluent Austria
15 December 2010PresseuropDer Standard -
7 December 20101PresseuropGandul
-
Portugal
Half a million working poor
2 December 2010PresseuropJornal de Notícias -
Austerity
Rage spreads across Europe
25 November 2010PresseuropPúblico -
Debates
Mind the pay gap
15 November 20102The Times London -
Portugal
Brussels down on national labour law
5 November 2010PresseuropDiário de Notícias -
Austerity
Pity the poor civil servant
27 October 2010Il Foglio Milan -
Austerity
Unions head for Judgement Thursday
25 October 2010PresseuropRzeczpospolita -
Netherlands
EU court rules against unscrupulous bosses
22 October 2010PresseuropDe Volkskrant -
Press review
Thatcher heirs make the dream come true
21 October 20101Presseurop -
United Kingdom
Paris calling, but why not London?
21 October 20102The New York Times New York -
19 October 20101Presseurop
-
19 October 20101Frankfurter Rundschau Frankfurt
In Ceausescu's times thousands of Romanians, drawn by high wages, flocked to the coalfields of the Jiu Valley. Today many of the mines in the valley are closed and the miners have been left to fend for themselves. Many are sliding into criminality.
Faced with the economic crisis, Lithuanian medical staff are increasingly leaving to work in Norway, where salaries are much higher. Although they do not become exiles, they do have to contend with a permanent schedule of return journeys between Oslo and Vilnius. 
In spite of the euro crisis, there are no signs whatsoever of an exodus of Greek, Spanish or Portuguese migrants. Only a few Southern Europeans are daring to move to healthier euro countries in an attempt to escape unemployment and low wages. Extracts. 
He wanted justice, and for it risked family, work and health – to lose it all. Guido Strack was once an ambitious officer with the European Commission. But that was before he began to draw attention to abuses in his department. 
Six member States refuse to allow funds from the Common Agricultural Policy to be used as food aid to the poor. On 1 January 2012, the budget for assistance to 18 million Europeans may drop from 480 to 113.5 million euros. It's a possibility that revolts La Libre Belgique. 
The crisis has accelerated the emergence of a new social class in Europe. Dubbed "the precariat" by sociologists, it is made up of young people with no prospect of a decent job or a reasonable standard of living. 
As governments prepare their 2012 budgets, with the middle classes expected to tighten austerity belts to clean up the public accounts, more and more super-rich in several countries are expressing their readiness to share the burden and are asking to pay more tax. 
Europe is bailing out its financial centres, but not its youth. Three basic conditions – education, employment and housing – are denied them. So when they fight back, says Der Standard's writer, they're just following the message from the top: take what you can and get out. 
As part of his package of austerity measures voted in June, the Greek PM plans to sell off state assets like the national electricity board. But in a manner symptomatic of how deeply intertwined his country’s various forces are, he faces the hostility of a union his own party helped create. 
On 1 May, the doors will open wide for Poles, Czechs and other eastern Europeans now free to work in Germany. But no one expects a stampede. Quite the opposite: German companies will have to woo the new guest workers ardently and assiduously. 
In one corner – Germany, in search of skilled workers to feed its recovery. In the other, a Spain in crisis, where young graduates have no future. As in the sixties, a new flow of economic migrants might be making their way north. 
Both on the left and right, consensus in growing that the ever widening gap between executive pay and ordinary wages is squeezing out the middle class, and undermining our democracies, writes Times columnist Anatole Kaletsky. 
They used to have it made — nice easy work, good pensions and job security — but the swingeing cuts that have come with the crisis threaten to end forever the cushy life of Europe's fast-disappearing civil servants. 
While Britain’s left leaning press is howling at the sheer scale of Chancellor George Osborne’s €91.5 billion cuts, conservatives are praying that this scaling back of the state will quickly lead to growth. 
While millions are taking to the streets of France to protest against the Sarkozy government’s proposed raising of retirement age, England, once the scene of anti-Thatcher riots in the nineties is quiet as her heirs in the Cameron adminstration implement the severest cuts in living memory. 
The campaign against pension reform has provided a catalyst for other movements that are less easily controlled. Now that marching workers have been joined by huge numbers of secondary school students, the French press worries about a situation that could soon get out of hand. 
What with service stations out of petrol, protesters setting cars on fire, schools closed, the mass demonstrations against the pension reform are plunging France into chaos. But it’s not just about pensions: the people are up in arms about what many consider an unjust system.