In January 2021, the unemployment rate in Poland was 3.1 percent, which is the lowest result in the entire European Union, according to data provided by Eurostat. In recent months, Poland managed to overtake the Czech Republic in terms of a low unemployment rate. Until the end of last year, the Czech Republic enjoyed the title of the country with the statistically lowest unemployment rate in the EU.

What is even more surprising is the fact that on the threshold of joining the European Union we had the highest unemployment among all the countries of the community. In January 2002, the unemployment rate was as high as 19.4 percent.

Some economists note that Poland managed to achieve a low level of unemployment despite admitting relatively the largest number of economic immigrants in recent years.

"The fact is that if it were not for the largest inflow of temporary foreign workers per capita (or per unit of GDP) in the EU, the unemployment rate in Poland would be even lower (de facto too low with serious tensions in the economy and loss of competitiveness)," Piotr Bujak, the chief economist PKO BP, pointed out.

On the other hand, to the argument that unemployment in Poland would have been higher if a group of 2.5 million Poles had not emigrated for work in the first decade of the 21st century, answered Marek Tatała, vice president of the Civic Development Forum.

“It is a myth that there is a certain number of jobs in the economy and if they had not left, unemployment would have been higher. Secondly, it is not worth remembering them all the time because most of them will not come back to Poland, because closing the development gap will take a long time,” Tatała wrote.

(300gospodarka)