However, the ETUC also stresses that the other side of the equation - creating quality jobs - is of equal importance. European business needs to create good quality jobs so that skilled workers are matched into productive positions. European business also needs to increase the workability [1] of many jobs so that workers no longer find it impossible to take up a job because it pays poverty wages, forces them to work long and unsocial hours or makes it impossible to combine work and private life.

To do so, the ETUC calls upon the Commission and the European Council to raise working standards by turning the agenda of job quality into a new policy priority for the next cycle of the Lisbon integrated guidelines.

Says Walter Cerfeda, Confederal Secretary of the ETUC: “Already one third of workers in Europe find themselves in a job that is below their level of skills and qualifications. This waste of human capital needs to be stopped. On top of investing in skills, Europe also needs a policy agenda of better jobs for better skills.”