While the highest unemployment rates in the Western Balkans are observed among individuals with low education, Albania appears to be an exception.
A recent report by the World Bank and the Vienna Institute regarding the labor market in the region highlights several phenomena encountered case by case.
“When analyzing unemployment rates by educational level, it becomes clear that individuals with lower levels of education continue to face higher unemployment rates across the Western Balkans.
However, Albania stands out as an exception, as the highest unemployment rates are observed among individuals with secondary education, rather than among those with low education,” the report states.
The document also notes that both in the Western Balkans and in the EU, the general trend remains the same: higher education is usually associated with lower unemployment rates.
However, there are some slight differences between regions. Among those with low education, the unemployment gap between the Western Balkans and the EU is relatively small, only 2.5 percentage points.
But this difference widens significantly among individuals with secondary education, reaching 6.1 percentage points, as well as among those with higher education, where the difference is 4.2 percentage points.
The data shows that all three education groups saw a decline in unemployment in 2023, with the largest decrease among individuals with a secondary education, where unemployment fell by 1 percentage point.
"However, the obvious differences between countries make it difficult to draw generalizations about trends."
In Bosnia and Herzegovina and North Macedonia, the largest decrease was recorded among individuals with low education; in Serbia and Kosovo, the largest improvement was observed among those with secondary education; while in Albania and Montenegro, the largest reduction in unemployment was seen among individuals with higher education.
Similarly, no clear patterns emerge when looking at comparator EU countries. However, in the EU as a whole, individuals with low education saw a larger decline in unemployment than the other two groups,” the report says. /Monitor
