EU Benefits from Bulgarian, Romanian Workers' Mobility - EC

European Commissioner for Employment and Social Affairs, Laszlo Andor. Photo by EPA/BGNES

The mobile workers from Romania and Bulgaria have played an overall positive role in the receiving EU countries economies, a report published by the European Commission reveals.

Bulgaria and Romania's mobile workers have contributed to the skills mix as well as filling vacancies in sectors and jobs with labour shortages such as in construction and the domestic and food services sectors.

Estimates also show a positive impact of the free movement of Romanian and Bulgarian workers on the EU's long-term GDP with an increase by about 0.3% for EU-27 (0.4% for eu-15).

Studies show too that there has been no significant impact on unemployment or wages of local workers in receiving countries: in the EU-15 studies show wages are on average only 0.28% lower they would have been without mobility of the two EU newcomers.

The report also highlights that there is no evidence of a disproportionate use of benefits by intra-EU mobile EU citizens and that the impact of recent flows on national public finances is negligible or positive.

"Moving between countries offers real opportunities and economic benefits for both the host countries and the EU as a whole. We see that geographical mobility very much depends on the trends of the economy and where the jobs are," EU Commissioner for Employment, Social Affairs and Inclusion Laszlo Andor stated at a conference in Vienna, as cited in a European Commission press release.

"Restricting the free movement of workers in Europe is not the answer to high unemployment. What we need to do is really to focus our efforts on creating new job opportunities," he added.

The main destination for movers form Bulgaria and Romania was to Italy and Spain and data suggest that, at the end of 2010, twice as many Bulgarians and Romanians (2.9 million) were residing in the EU-25 compared to 2006.

At the same time, in relative terms, EU-2 (Bulgarian and Romanian) nationals resident in an EU-25 Member State only represent 0.6 % of the total EU-25 population. The highest share is in Cyprus (4.1%), Spain (2.2 %) and Italy (1.8 %). In addition, the EU-2 employment rate (63%) is close to that of the EU-25 (65%).

However, since the economic downturn, recently arrived EU-2 nationals have found it more difficult to find a job: around 16% were out of work in 2010, compared to 9% in 2007. What is clear is that recent EU-2 movers have played a very minor role in the labour market crisis which is a direct consequence of the financial and economic crisis, as well as structural labour market problems.

The Commission report will serve as the basis on which the European Council will carry out a review of how the transitional arrangements on free movement of Bulgarian and Romanian workers have worked in practice.

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