Evolution of public employment services

Abstract

The writer, starting with the statement that the public employment services (SPE) are a consequence of unemployment, divides their evolution into three phases. The first corresponds to the period preceding the Second World War, in which general or cyclical unemployment dominates. And, where SPE start to have the function of mere «middlemen», between the demand and the supply of labour, contributing very little in terms of qualitative activity. The second phase corresponds to a period of great acceleration in economic activity, characterized by the predominance of structural unemployment and, in particular, technological unemployment, which allows the SPE to develop methods of placement. Here, the selection process becomes of the uttmost importance. For this reason the complementary services of job placement, such as professional training, professional orientation, professional rehabilitation, the health services in the work place and, in some cases, the social services, assume greater importance. The third phase, with the accelerated technological development, in particular in the area of microelectronics, corresponds to the period that follows the first oil crisis. It also reveals new equipment that makes manual labour redundant causing its transfer to the services sector. Characteristics of this period are the co-existence of unemployment and inflation; the flexibility of labour regulations; the diminishing of importance of the labour market; the establishment and development of professional training continues, on account of the rapid obsoleteness of equipment and professions; the inward-turning of the labour market; the adoption of specific measures; and, with the view to creating jobs, unfavourable to macroeconomic measures; the tendency of the SPE to emphasize their involvement in the labour market through the
use of financial means. It appears to the writer that the IEFP has become overly involved in this approach, placing too much emphasis on its indirect role as promoter, to the detriment of its direct role, as author. The article ends with a combination of questions/suggestions regarding the organism's activity.