INTRODUCTION

Albania is one of the economically last developed countries in Europe. After the collapse of the communist regime, Albania achieved an economical growth, but poverty level is still high. There is a strong link between poverty and unemployment because the lack of employment is one of the main determinants of poverty. Albania is considered as a poor country, that’s why a high level of unemployment exists. This is a phenomenon that disquiets the Albania’s society, so it is important to discus about this topic.

This paper gives the unemployment level and its changing during years in Albania. The period of time that we have taken into account is 1995-2009.

In this paper we are going to talk about the unemployment’s concept at the beginning and then its effects on the economy and society in chapter 5. We are going to give the unemployment rate of Albania, during this period according to age, gender and education and its values in different cities in chapter 3. Another point that will be shown in this paper is of course the precautions taken by the government to reduce the unemployment rate given in chapter 6. And finally we are going to show the conclusions of our work.

GENERAL OVERVIEW ABOUT UNEMPLOYMENT

2.1. UNEMPLOYMENT’S CONCEPT

Unemployment is the time period when a person isn’t actually working, but available for work and currently looking for work. The working age population includes people from 16 years old to 65 years old for men and 60 for women. It consists of two groups: active population (labor force) and inactive population.

Labor force includes employed and those in search of employment (the unemployment people). In this assessment should be taken into account the difference between:

-Individuals currently working, considered those who accomplish a payable work of residence, even if temporally absent from work.

– The unemployed, those considered not at work, but actively seeking employment or waiting to return to work.

Outside the labor force are classified people that are in working age but they aren’t currently working or they don’t want to. This group consists of students, the invalids, students of working age, those who perform military service, and persons not currently looking for work.

The flow of movement between these categories can be expressed with the Fig.2, where:

1 shows the flow of people who change job.

2 show the flow of people who lose their job.

3 show the flow of people from the ranks of unemployed who find a job.

4 show the emergence of the unemployed out of the labor force (as unemployed who do not require work anymore).

5 show the entry or the reentry in labor force, but first as unemployed.

6 show entry or reentry in labor force, but now as busy at work.

7 show the loss of employment and the exit out of the labor force (such as pensioners, or people returning to school).

The total number of losing jobs is given by the amount of movement 1, 2 and 7.

The total number of finding jobs is given by the amount of movement is 1, 3 and 6.

The difference between the losing jobs and the finding jobs shows the difference in employment.

Changes in unemployment are given by the difference (5+2) – (3+4).

Changes in unemployment measured by the unemployment rate, which represents the percentage ratio of the number of unemployed and the labor force:

Unemployment rate= (unemployed workers / total labor force) Ã- 100%.1

TYPES OF UNEMPLOYMENT

Unemployment is an inevitable process for each country, so that we can find it among each person in different kinds. The most kind of unemployment we can find in Albania are:

Frictional unemployment, which is created as a result of continued movement of workers from one job in search of another job, which is better than the first. This kind of unemployment is inevitable and economically justifiable, as leading to more efficient redistribute of labor resources. In this group are also included students who have just been graduated and are looking for a job, or women that have been away for a while from the labor market. These people are considered as volunteers unemployed.1

Structural unemployment, that occurs due to changes in demand and the supply to work as a result of fundamental changes occurring in the basic branches of economy. If an economy suffers from long-lasting low aggregate demand, it means that many of the unempl