The situation on the labor market is changing dynamically. Until recently, expert forecasts, including Personnel Service, assumed an increase in unemployment to even 10 percent. According to Krzysztof Inglot, President of the Management Board of Personnel Service, after a few weeks of pandemics, it can be seen that the situation is more optimistic. Unemployment in Poland will not increase as dramatically as it is expected, among others by European Commission. Its forecasts suggest that the coronavirus crisis will mean that the unemployment rate may more than double this year - from 3.3 percent (Eurostat, 2019) to as much as 7.5 percent. Thus, Poland would be at the forefront of countries with the highest increase in this indicator. A worse slump would only occur in the Czech Republic.

"The factor limiting the scale of the increase in unemployment in Poland will be jobs freed by economic migrants. Those, because of difficult border traffic, will not come to us. Their places will be taken by Poles," estimates Inglot.

Various analyzes show that about 1.2 million labor immigrants live in Poland each year, mainly from Ukraine. Due to restrictions on border traffic, they will not come to Poland as often. This is good information for Polish employees who are at risk of losing their job or have already lost it. Instead of supplying the unemployed, many of them will find jobs in those market sectors in which Ukrainians have dominated so far and where hands are still needed for work.

"Thus, as it turns out, labor immigration is the best airbag for the Polish labor market and protects Polish workers against the COVID-19 crisis. An additional buffer on the labor market will be employees from Poland who do not decide to go to seasonal work abroad," summarizes the president of Personnel Service.

(WBJ)