The Spanish labor market is beginning to be characterized by the volatility of contracts.
Temporary contracts are inherently volatile. They have an expiration date for the almost 3 million workers who have temporary contracts.
As there are 15 million workers with an indefinite contract, it could be said that the Spanish labor market is stable. 3 million out of a total of 18 are 16%; although statistically it is considered that they are 13% due to the way they are counted.
However, that is not so.
First, because At the European level the average is 10%, in France and Italy it is 11%. Our labor market is more volatile.
Everyone knows that the so-called “discontinuous permanent” workers, in large part, are “volatile permanent workers”
Second, because The Spanish permanent contract is becoming a temporary contract. The turnover, or departure from the company, of workers with permanent contracts has grown and grown in recent years. Their duration has been substantially shortened and they have become “defined contracts” that rotate almost more than temporary ones.
In addition, a part of Spanish workers, after the Labor Reform of Minister Yolanda Díaz (2022), have moved to contract status. “fixed discontinuous”.
Everyone knows that the so-called “discontinuous permanent” workers, to a large extent, are “volatile permanent workers”.
They do not appear as unemployed for statistical purposes, but their contracts are largely temporary. These are not territories where the discontinuous fixed-term figure existed traditionally. For example, in warehouses processing agricultural products subject to seasonal weather.
But that 2022 reform insisted on grouping many employees who did not respond to that seasonal need under the figure of the “discontinuous permanent” contract.
It can be considered that this “fixed discontinuous” contract is actually a temporary contract, which disguised as “fixed discontinuous” does not count as unemployed.
In this way, it reduced the official number of unemployed in the SEPE to disguise unemployment, just as those who are taking recycling “courses” are discounted as unemployed.
In fact, a worker with a discontinuous permanent contract, except in traditional sectors, usually finds himself in another job before being “called” by his employer to return to the position; in which he was when he began to collect the unemployment benefit or subsidy if applicable.
More than 50% do not return to their original position. In reality, the rotation or departure of “discontinuous permanent” employees from companies represents 29% of the total More volatile than temporary ones!
Furthermore, if the worker with a discontinuous permanent contract is not “called”, he is dismissed with the consequent compensation. Therefore, it can be considered that this “fixed discontinuous” contract is actually a temporary contract, which disguised as “fixed discontinuous” does not count as unemployed. Last month there were approximately 750,000 inactive discontinuous permanent employees.
This volatility of the labor market is harmful to the productivity of companies and for the learning and social stability of workers.
The average Spanish family does not understand gold and other materials as a refuge value. But if you know that the “stones” remain
If you add a rise in housing prices to a volatile labor market, how is a low- and medium-level worker going to commit to a mortgage? In addition to earning an amount with little purchasing power, he does not know if his employment situation will be stable. I would have to think about rent.
So why is the volume of real estate sales increasing? A possible explanation is that family savings and foreign money are using real estate as “safe haven value.” The average Spanish family does not understand gold and other materials as a refuge value. But he does know that the “stones” remain.
In reality, there is a hoarding of real estate assets, especially housing.
The logical thing would be for these purchases to go into the rental market, allowing workers in the volatile labor market to have a house to live in. But due to the bad Housing Law, the housing stock does not go to the rental market, or if it does appear, it is at prohibitive prices for workers in a volatile labor market. Because this Law defends “squatters”, renters, and similar figures, and penalizes the owner, who flees the risk.
And it produces the paradox of a buoyant real estate market with a shortage of housing for the working class, which always ends up paying for the demagoguery of the “progressive governments”.
** JR Pin Arboledas is a professor at IESE.