Education and Employment Opportunities for the Roma
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Education and Employment Opportunities for the Roma NIALL O’HIGGINS1 & ANDREY IVANOV2 1
CELPE & CSEF, Dipartimento di Scienze Economiche e Statistiche (DiSES), Universita` degli Studi di Salerno, Salerno, Italy. E-mail: [email protected]; 2 United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), Regional Centre, Europe and the CIS, Bratislava, Slovakia. E-mail: [email protected]
The Roma more than anyone else lost out in the transition to the market economy in the countries of Central and South Eastern Europe. Their unemployment rate is 100 per cent in some rural areas and the Roma’s dependence on government benefits is widespread. This article takes a look at unemployment and employment among the Roma on the basis of two surveys completed in 2002 and 2004. It is shown that lack of formal education cannot provide a full explanation of the relatively high unemployment rates faced by Roma and that at least part of the problem arises from discrimination in employment. Roma are also disproportionately employed in low-quality jobs in the informal sector. The paper argues that programmes aimed at combatting labour market and income disadvantages of the Roma must be based on the development of opportunities for autonomous income generation rather than the public works temporary employment programmes currently prevalent. Comparative Economic Studies (2006) 48, 6–19. doi:10.1057/palgrave.ces.8100147
Keywords: Roma, education, employment, South Eastern Europe JEL Classifications: J15, J23, P27
INTRODUCTION In some ways the title of this article is excessively optimistic. Given the high unemployment rates among the Roma, perhaps the title should be ‘Opportunities for Roma to Avoid Unemployment’. The distinction between ‘increasing employment opportunities’ and ‘avoiding an increase in unemployment’ is not just a semantic one. The positive connotation of the first phrase unfortunately does not correspond to the reality Roma are facing. The development challenges for Roma communities are not so much about
N O’Higgins & A Ivanov Roma: Education and Employment
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‘improving their welfare’ but rather ‘avoiding a decline in their employment status’. According to official statistics, Roma unemployment often reaches 95–100 per cent. These figures do not, however, record involvement in the informal sector, which is not often considered to be employment. Surveys were conducted in part to gain an accurate quantitative picture of the levels of real unemployment among the Roma.1 The survey from 2002 was the first attempt to carry out an integrated household survey to clearly distinguish between ‘wage employment’ and ‘income generation activities’, which include work in the informal sector. The ‘Vulnerable Groups Survey’ from 2004 was a followup of the former elaborating in-depth methodological aspects of vulnerability research (sampling, appropriate sets of indicators, fieldwork) targeting marginalised populations like the Roma. The survey in 2004 employed a format similar to that of an integrated household
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