21.03.2024
MUNICIPAL LABOR MARKETS ARE BEING RESTORED
The municipalities in the Montana region are gradually overcoming the consequences of the covid crisis and rebuilding their economy. In Brusartsi, Lom and Valchedrum, the number of employed people exceeds the level of 2019. The Municipality of Georgi Damyanovo is second in the country in terms of "loss" of employees. The municipality of Montana is first in the Northwest in terms of the share of employed people. This is shown by the analyzes of the Institute of Market Economy for the year 2022.
The recovery of the regional labor markets is uneven, experts of the Institute of Market Economy note. In the Montana region, the largest number of people started work in the city of Montana. Employment during the reporting period was provided to 14,303 people, which is 3.2 percent less compared to 2019. Calculations show that their share among people over 15 years of age is 36.7 percent. According to this indicator, the municipality is ahead of Vratsa - there it is 34.4 percent and Vidin, where it is 28.3 percent.
Almost three times less citizens - 5150 people - were placed on the labor market in Lom. This is 28.4 percent of the working-age population. The increase in the employed compared to the time before the pandemic was 2.1 percent. From the bottom reached in 2020, the municipality of Valchedrum has pushed back. 909 people were employed there, which is an increase of 0.4 percent. The situation is more favorable in Brusartsi. For the year, 413 people found work, or 11.9 percent of the residents work. The increase is by 5.9 percent compared to 2019. Thus, the municipality of Brusartsi occupies the first place in terms of change in the number of employed people in the district.
In more than two-thirds of the municipalities in the country, the employed remain below the record levels of 2019. This includes the remaining municipalities from the Montana region. In the municipality of Georgi Damyanovo, there is the most significant loss of minus 30.5 percent of working people - first is the municipality of Nikola Kozlevo (-33%), after us are the municipality of Koprivshtitsa and the municipality of Ivaylovgrad (-24%), and the reasons for this are the most -already demographically, as a result of the rapid decline of the working-age population. In the Montana region, they follow the municipality of Yakimovo with minus 15.4 percent, the municipality of Chiprovtsi - with minus 14.8 percent, the municipality of Boychinovtsi - minus 13 percent, the municipality of Berkovitsa - minus 7.2 percent, the municipality of Varshets - minus 5.8 percent . The most serious delays are seen in municipalities with a focus on the local economy in tourism and in those with the most significant demographic problems, the Institute for Market Economy points out.
"Our municipalities with less than 1,000 employees are 80, compared to 82 a year earlier, and those with less than 2,000 - 135, or half of all. As expected given their large population, all the municipalities in the top twenty are regional centers", the Institute for Market Economy points out.
The data show that the fewest people in the district are employed in the municipality of Georgi Damyanovo (287), Medkovets (356), Brusartsi (413), Yakimovo (424), Chiprovtsi (436), Boychinovtsi (715). In the group with less than 2,000 employees is the municipality of Varshets, where 1,109 people were employed on the labor market. More than twice as many, 2701 people, are in Berkovitsa municipality.
"As the labor market recovery appears to be over, at least in the leading municipal economies, it is worth comparing the numbers employed in 2019, a record for the labor market in many places. In 178 municipalities, however, there is a decrease in the number of employees, and this is most visible in Varna (-5.1 thousand employees), Nessebar (-3.3 thousand employees), Kazanlak (-3 thousand employees), Burgas (-2 .5 thousand workers). It seems that the declines are mainly related to the inability of the tourism industry to restore its employment to pre-crisis levels", the experts point out.
The data indicate that the number of employed persons in the country reaches 2.27 million people. In 2020, it fell to 2.2 million, but still far from the record of 2.32 million employed in 2019. The most are in Sofia - 768,000 people, followed by Plovdiv with 143,000 and Varna with 124,000 citizens. There are a total of sixteen municipalities with over 20,000 employees. Industrial regions succeed in creating new jobs the fastest. In Plovdiv's Maritsa and Rodopi, the number of workers increased by 1.7 thousand and 1.5 thousand people respectively, in Bozhurishte - by over 900 people. Here, too, the largest increases are in relatively small municipalities, among them Kovachevtsi (64%) and Novo Selo (53%), according to the observations of the Institute for Market Economy.
