Greece's Convergence to EU Standards: Is It Feasible for Greece to Attain an Unemployment Rate Below 10%?

Agiomirgianakis George, Liargovas Panagiotis, Bertsatos Georgios and Sfakianakis George
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Agiomirgianakis George: Hellenic Mediterranean University, Heraklion, Greece; Hellenic Open University, Patras, Greece
Liargovas Panagiotis: Centre of Planning and Economic Research, Athens, Greece; University of Peloponnese, Tripoli, Greece
Bertsatos Georgios: Centre of Planning and Economic Research, Athens, Greece; Gulf One Lab for Computational & Economic Research, U.K.
Sfakianakis George: Hellenic Open University, Patras, Greece; National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Athens, Greece

Journal of Economic Integration, 2025, vol. 40, issue 2, 237-253

Abstract: Given the theory of efficient unemployment and using Eurostat data, it turns out that the average annual unemployment in Greece over the last -at least- 15 years has been consistently below 10% when job vacancies are considered. Given that based on cumulative data for the period 2010-2022 job vacancies are estimated to be between 98 thousand and 123 thousand, we argue that an appropriate indicator for the degree of slackness/tightness of the Greek labor market should combine both unemployed persons and job vacancies. That is, the u* indicator of the full-employment rate of unemployment (FERU). Our analysis shows that if the positive trends of the declining unemployment rate and increasing job vacancy rate continue, a full-employment state could be reached even in the next 3.5 years converging to EU standards.

Keywords: Labor Market; Unemployment; Vacancies; Greece (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: E24 E61 J63 J64 O52 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
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