RIGA — Whether Latvian unemployment is actually decreasing or not, the situation for the jobless remains very difficult.

Lowered unemployment benefits that are not enough to live on independently and for every vacant job there’s an average of 64 applicants, meaning employers are free to offer as little as possible for wages and benefits. Meanwhile Latvia’s State Employment Agency shows unemployment having declined by a measly 0.1 percent in June, down to 15.6 percent and Eurostat’s numbers are steady at 20 percent, the highest amount of jobless in the European Union.

The high level of unemployment is one of the primary reasons 25 percent of loans in the country are delinquent and the Latvian parliament is looking to reform bankruptcy laws. Currently, the law of natural persons in case of insolvency does not allow excluding settlement options in cases between creditors and debtors, but the bill allows a specific period after the termination of the solvency for the process of debt relief.

This article is free to view. To read Baltic Reports’ subscription-only articles, click here.