Facing the future - exploring the key challenges for Europe in the election year -

Psychosocial risks represent a major challenge to the health and well-being of workers in the EU. While the COVID-19 pandemic intensified some of these risks, it also increased awareness of them among policymakers. Using data from the European Working Conditions Telephone Survey 2021 and building on a theoretical model that differentiates between job stressors and job resources, this report examines key psychosocial risks in the workplace and their impact on health. It also assesses job characteristics that could help to protect workers’ health and well-being in post-pandemic workplaces. While the prevalence of psychosocial risks varies across the Member States, work–life interference and work intensity are the most widespread risks in the EU, and the prevalence of the latter increased during the pandemic. Job stressors such as adverse social behaviour and job insecurity continue to be experienced by a significant proportion of workers in the EU. Although resources are available to combat some risks, these may not be sufficient, and preventive policies need to be implemented to prevent risks from arising in the first place.

This 2024 annual review of minimum wages provides a synopsis of minimum wage setting during 2023 in the EU27 and Norway. It reports in detail on the processes and outcomes of setting the minimum wage rates for 2024 and beyond. It investigates the extent to which minimum wage earners were affected by the cost-of-living crisis and shows how minimum wage workers are distributed across households over the entire income distribution. The report also addresses the criteria that minimum wage setters considered when setting the new rates for 2024 and to what extent these criteria already include the minimum elements mentioned in Article 5 of the EU Minimum Wage Directive. It provides some initial insights into Member States’ activities around the transposition of the directive, which was a moving target at the time of drafting the report. Finally, an overview of the latest minimum wage research related to the EU27 and Norway completes this report.

This report investigates the political dimensions of social cohesion in Europe, offering a 20-year perspective derived from 10 rounds of the European Social Survey. It scrutinises trends and regional variations in political participation, examining correlations with levels of institutional distrust and discontent. In addition, the report explores political engagement amid the COVID-19 pandemic, utilising insights from the Living, working and COVID-19 e-survey. Unemployment emerges as the primary driver of political disengagement, a pivotal finding of the analysis.

Furthermore, the report uncovers significant disparities in political engagement across European regions. Regions with well-educated populations tend to exhibit higher levels of political activity, and economic prosperity and migration rates have only a modest influence on political activity.

The report also highlights the variation in institutional distrust across regions. Nordic countries display markedly lower levels of distrust in their institutions than continental countries, whereas in eastern European and Mediterranean countries levels are markedly higher.

Over the last decade, information and communication technologies have changed the way employees work and communicate with each other. While the digitalisation of work offers many benefits, widespread access to digital devices in working life has created new forms of antisocial behaviour. This report maps national regulatory instruments aimed at counteracting antisocial behaviours at work, particularly bullying and harassment. Legislative reviews indicate that in many Member States online forms of abuse are often viewed as extensions of the traditional form of face-to-face bullying or harassment rather than as a distinct phenomenon requiring separate regulation. Some countries have amended existing legislation to include cyberbullying and online harassment. This report reviews to what extent such online conduct is regulated in EU Member States and Norway. As regulatory change is generally prompted by a certain level of policy debate, the report also explores national-level debates and whether there is empirical evidence documenting the issue or that potentially indicate a rise in the phenomenon.