Measures to reduce unemployment
In its first meeting on Monday, the new Government Council for Employment approved a series of targeted actions intended to support the unemployed and strengthen entrepreneurship, with an aim of creating 770,000 jobs by 2020.
Chaired by Prime Minister Antonis Samaras and with the participation of more than 10 ministers and representatives of various social groups, the meeting agreed on actions ranging from the creation of a register for healthy enterprises to strong incentives such as the reduction of non-salary costs for companies that comply with labor law and create jobs.
Labor Minister Yiannis Vroutsis reportedly said that the so-called “white register” of healthy and compliant companies will spare them from repeated and extensive checks, allowing monitoring mechanisms to focus on cases of serious or repeated violators.
Vroutsis did not rule out the reduction of social security contributions by compliant entrepreneurs within 2014. After all, the government has undertaken an obligation to its creditors to have the contributions reduced by 1 percent by the end of 2016, provided social security funds are not mired in deficits.
