Sixth European Working Conditions survey: overview report

Since 1991, Eurofound has been monitoring working conditions in Europe through its European Working Conditions Survey (EWCS). The survey aims to measure working conditions across European countries, analyse the relationships between different aspects of these, identify groups at risk, highlight issues of concern and areas of progress and, ultimately, contribute to developing EU policy aimed at improving job quality. In 2015, the sixth EWCS interviewed almost 44,000 workers (both employees and self-employed people) in 35 European countries: the 28 EU Member States, the five EU candidate countries, and Norway and Switzerland. Workers were asked a range of questions concerning employment status, work organisation, learning and training, working time duration and organisation, physical and psychosocial risk factors, health and safety, work-life balance, worker participation, earnings and financial security, as well as work and health.

Overall, structural inequalities and differences in terms of gender, employment status and occupation are still significant. The research constructed seven job quality indices, representing different dimensions of job quality: physical environment, work intensity, working time quality, social environment, skills and discretion, and prospects and earnings. These dimensions were selected on the basis of their proven impact (positive or negative) on the health and well-being of workers. In the last 10 years, there has been limited progress in some job quality indices.

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