The impact of ageing at regional level: computing socio-demographic changes

Jörg Peschner, European Commission

Over the next decade, the implications of demographic ageing on employment are expected to intensify. Eurostat demographic projections foresee a decline of the working age population already starting in 2013. On this issue, so far, the analysis of the implication of ageing in the labour market was almost exclusively focused at EU and national level. However, this approach seriously undermines the strong regional component of workforce ageing and the existing diversity of situations at regional level which are of critical importance given the relatively low intra-EU mobility. So far, in the context of the EU2020, little analysis has been suggested concerning the regional labour markets. However, it is clear that given the ageing pattern and the foreseen growing scarcity of human resources, the analysis of the regional dimension will be of critical importance for future labour market policies, the identification of future skill needs and relevant funding activities of the ESF (local performance measurement). Regional labour supply has already substantially shrunk in a number of regions across Europe and more regions will experience similar or even more intense patterns in the coming years. For these reasons the author is developing a software-based projection tool for the EU Commission, Employment, Social Affairs and Equal Opportunities DG, to strengthen its analytical capacity in the area of regional labour markets. Technically, the main objective is the projection of regional labour supply, broken down by age, gender, educational attainment level and employment status. Due to data availability, analysis concentrates on NUTS2 territorial level (there are some 300 NUTS2 European regions considered).