Ukraine to lose over third of workforce by 2050

Ukraine will lose over a third of the workforce until 2050 since the country's population is shrinking and aging.

Ukraine will lose about 15% of the workforce by 2030, while the drop will reach 30% in 2050. Among all the countries of Central and Eastern Europe, the situation is worse only in Latvia and Bulgaria. The population of Ukraine is steadily declining, young people are going abroad, the birth rate does not cover these losses and the average age of Ukrainians is constantly growing, a Ukrainian morning TV show "Snidanok z 1+1" reported with reference to a study of the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

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In general, such a situation in all countries of the center and east of Europe, with the exception of Turkey, has a negative trend. For example, the Czech Republic, Poland and Slovakia simplify procedures for migrant workers to solve the problem. They cover a labor shortage by them and regard Ukraine as a source of labor migration.

"Labor migrants do not come to Ukraine. Therefore, the IMF advises our country to more actively hire older employees, i.e. 55 and older. There are some categories of companies in our country with a great number of such employees," reads the report.

And yet, most Ukrainian companies are looking for young people. The lion's share of vacancies on job search websites shows employers are looking for people under the age of 35.

"Due to the fact that there has been a prejudice for decades that the best age for a candidate is 25-35, and after 30 it is already such an early old age and there is no one to be considered at all, then even we have an average age of 70 years, it turns out that employers do not really need us after 35," the report said.

However, IMF forecasts for Ukraine are the most optimistic. In their opinion, moderate reforms are able to compensate for half the loss of the workforce. The IMF advises to actively involve men over 55 years old and women over 35, increase the retirement age and reduce the cost of medicine and retirement.

As UNIAN reported earlier, over 1.3 million labor migrants had left Ukraine since March 20, 2018. The number is increased by two persons per minute.