Ministry of Labour: Our unemployment rate is low but the number of the unemployed is as high as in Lithuania
The whole world is afraid of losing jobs due to the crisis; however, the unemployment rate is going down in Belarus. According to the Ministry of Labour, the unemployment rate is 0.8%. The number of the unemployed decreased from 46 to 37 thousands over the last year. The Minister of Labour says that the state is not going to increase the dole. ERB has talked to an unemployed person and to an employee of a labor registry office and has found out a lot of interesting details.
Alena Malyutnіkava from Homel is a mother of three children who cannot find a job after a maternity leave. According to Alena, the unemployed who come to labor registry offices are advised to look for jobs themselves:
"They openly told me that it would be no use and that I should better look for a job myself. I cannot say that the state helps people to find placement: you register and get some peanuts every month – about 47.6 thousands. But you cannot get the sum for doing nothing: you are engaged in so-called “public works”: you sweep streets, clean them from snow and work on a collective farm. They pay nothing for it. However, if you work on a collective farm, they may give you products: if you bring in apples, you may take some…”
It is rather easy to lose this dole. For example, it can happen if you refuse to work as a street-cleaner:
Alena Malyutnіkava: "Their method of finding jobs for the population is very interesting: you fill in a form and describe your terms of work – the schedule and the time. Then they may suggest you to work as a street-cleaner. You would have to work in another district, on the other edge of the city. Of course, I refused. They immediately added a note to my file saying that the jobless person refused from the job they offered. You will be expelled from the labour registry office after three refusals. You will also be expelled for not attending the obligatory monthly meeting”.
However, when ERB told Alena that the state was not going to increase the dole, she said that it was right:
"Why should they create good conditions for drunkards and loafers? They should better work on collective farms and make some money rather then get a huge dole and be able to drink, entertain and do nothing!”
A representative of the Ministry of Labour and Social Protection Halina Trafimenka agrees that the problem of unemployment in our country is not as simple as the statistics:
"Why should they increase the dole? We have more vacancies than we need in labor registry offices! There are certain problems with placement for the youth and women, but our rate is better than in the neighbouring countries! In fact, our systems of calculation of the rate of unemployment differ. For example, former Soviet republics and the Baltic States use the rules of the International Labour Organization for the calculation. If their rate is 18% and ours is 1% it only means that our systems of calculation differ and that the difference in the number of jobless people is not that great. The numbers may be equal”.
ERB has compared the unemployment rates and the doles in different European states.
We can see that the German dole is more than the average salary of a budget employee in Belarus (360 dollars). It seems that the Belarusian dole is the lowest. The same can be said about the unemployment rate.
Photo by — "Ukrainian News"
Alena Malyutnіkava from Homel is a mother of three children who cannot find a job after a maternity leave. According to Alena, the unemployed who come to labor registry offices are advised to look for jobs themselves:
"They openly told me that it would be no use and that I should better look for a job myself. I cannot say that the state helps people to find placement: you register and get some peanuts every month – about 47.6 thousands. But you cannot get the sum for doing nothing: you are engaged in so-called “public works”: you sweep streets, clean them from snow and work on a collective farm. They pay nothing for it. However, if you work on a collective farm, they may give you products: if you bring in apples, you may take some…”
It is rather easy to lose this dole. For example, it can happen if you refuse to work as a street-cleaner:
Alena Malyutnіkava: "Their method of finding jobs for the population is very interesting: you fill in a form and describe your terms of work – the schedule and the time. Then they may suggest you to work as a street-cleaner. You would have to work in another district, on the other edge of the city. Of course, I refused. They immediately added a note to my file saying that the jobless person refused from the job they offered. You will be expelled from the labour registry office after three refusals. You will also be expelled for not attending the obligatory monthly meeting”.
However, when ERB told Alena that the state was not going to increase the dole, she said that it was right:
"Why should they create good conditions for drunkards and loafers? They should better work on collective farms and make some money rather then get a huge dole and be able to drink, entertain and do nothing!”
A representative of the Ministry of Labour and Social Protection Halina Trafimenka agrees that the problem of unemployment in our country is not as simple as the statistics:
"Why should they increase the dole? We have more vacancies than we need in labor registry offices! There are certain problems with placement for the youth and women, but our rate is better than in the neighbouring countries! In fact, our systems of calculation of the rate of unemployment differ. For example, former Soviet republics and the Baltic States use the rules of the International Labour Organization for the calculation. If their rate is 18% and ours is 1% it only means that our systems of calculation differ and that the difference in the number of jobless people is not that great. The numbers may be equal”.
ERB has compared the unemployment rates and the doles in different European states.
| Country | Number of unemployed (percent of economically active population) | Dole (monthly, dollars) |
| Belarus | 0.9 | 16 |
| Ukraine | 3.2 | 73 |
| Russia | 7.7 | 80 |
| Lithuania | 8 | 67 |
| Latvia | 10.4 | 348 |
| Estonia | 9.2 | 30 |
| Germany | 7.8 | 625 |
| Poland | 10.5 | 100 |
We can see that the German dole is more than the average salary of a budget employee in Belarus (360 dollars). It seems that the Belarusian dole is the lowest. The same can be said about the unemployment rate.
Photo by — "Ukrainian News"
