According to the EU labor force survey, a significant proportion of non-EU citizens working in the European Union are overqualified for their jobs, at a much higher rate than EU citizens. In the Czech Republic, just 10% of workers from other EU countries are overqualified, compared to around 35% of non-EU workers. Photo Credit: Freepik / Illustrative Photo.
Czech Rep., Jul 22 (BD) – Recent data from the European Union (EU) labor force survey indicates that many non-EU citizens working in EU countries are overqualified for their jobs, at a much higher rate than nationals and workers from other EU countries.
Among EU member states, Greece has the highest share of overqualified non-EU citizens with over 70%, followed by Italy (65%) and Spain (55%). Italy and Cyprus have the highest rates of overqualified workers from other EU member states, each with over 50%. The countries with the most overqualified workers among nationals working in their own country were Spain (34%) and Cyprus (31%).
The lowest overqualification rates, regardless of the status of the workers, were in Luxembourg, with as few as around 3% of Luxembourg nationals recorded as overqualified for their jobs, 3.5% of EU citizens, and almost 11% of non-EU citizens.
The most dramatic gap in overqualification rates between nationals and non-EU citizens was observed in Portugal, of almost 35%.
In the Czech Republic, the most overqualified category are non-EU citizens (around 35%), compared to 10% of EU citizens and approximately 15% of Czech nationals.
Czech Republic has a lower share of overqualified EU citizens than Germany as well as its other neighbours Poland, and Austria, and is in fact second only to Luxembourg in this regard. However, there is a higher proportion of overqualified non-EU citizens in the Czech Republic than in Germany.
