Flexible employment forms continue to expand
The Greek labor market has presented a mixed picture over the last few months. While employment increased in February according to the Labor Ministry’s Ergani database, the majority of new hirings are in parttime or shift work.
According to the employment declarations (APD) that employers submit every month to the Single Social Security Entity (EFKA), flexible labor has grown to account for one in four workers, while six in every 10 hirings now concern parttime or shift work.
February data showed a monthly increase of 16,628 jobs, as hirings came to 150,345 while departures amounted to 133,717. This has been the third best performance for the month of February since 2001. The growth in February offset all the job losses recorded in January, taking the sum of the first couple of months in 2018 to +86, compared to end-December.
Full-time jobs only accounted for 43.67 percent or 65,659 of the new hirings, while part-time jobs totaled 62,406 and shift employment 22,280.
The latest EFKA figures available, concerning August 2017, show that flexible firms of labor accounted for 28.77 percent of all salaried jobs in Greece. Those employees received a gross average monthly salary of 416.09 euros. This contrasts with the average gross salary of full-time workers, which in August amounted to 1,161.72 euros. Across all employees, the average working month came to 21.96 days, data showed.