Unemployment in Fejér County

Some Lessons from an Empirical Labour Market Research

Abstract

In this paper we give an account of the results of an empirical research on the Fejér County labor market conducted in the first two months of 2001. The purpose of this research was to discover the facts, why this dynamic region of the country struggled with scarcity of labor force and unemployment at the same time. Especially foreign-owned companies wanted to hire foreign employees, when more than 12,000 unemployed workers were registered and the unemployment rate was 6.4 per cent in 2000. Notwithstanding this relatively high number, the composition of the unemployed did not allow for a real substitution of the existing labor force, having a positive effect on their wage as well. At a time when multinational corporations continuously had job announcements, only a small fraction of these 12,215 unemployed workers could be hired.

The result of this field study supported our view - based on the initial findings in the regional unemployment statistics - that in Fejér County, even though it was among the most dynamic and most developed regions of Hungary, there were substantial differences in the composition of the unemployed as well as in their chances to get a job. Due to many factors - though not with the same weight in all districts of the county labor market - only a fraction of the registered unemployed could find a job within a short period of time. On the one hand, low qualification, age, health and family problems of the potential workers were among these factors. On the other hand, overall lack of public transport contacts - due to the underdeveloped transport system of the county - had also a significant impact on unemployment, looking at the relatively long distance between the potential work place and the home of the unemployed.