UNEMPLOYMENT IN TUNISIA: FOR WANT OF A JOB...

C O N F I D E N T I A L TUNIS 001443 SIPDIS SIPDIS STATE FOR EEB (DIBBLE),NEA/MAG (HOPKINS AND HARRIS) STATE PASS USTR (DONNELLY AND BURKHEAD) AND USAID (MCCLOUD) USDOC FOR (VINEYARD AND MASON),ADVOCACY CTR (JAMES),AND CLDP (TEJTEL AND MCMANUS) USDOC PASS USPTO (ADAMS, BROWN AND MARSHALL) CASABLANCA FOR FCS (ORTIZ) CAIRO FOR FINANCIAL ATTACHE (SEVERENS) LONDON AND PARIS FOR NEA WATCHER E.O. 12958: DECL: 10/30/2017 TAGS: ELAB ECON SMIG PTER KDEM PGOV TS SUBJECT: UNEMPLOYMENT IN TUNISIA: FOR WANT OF A JOB... REF: A. TUNIS 1433 ¶B. TUNIS 948 Classified By: Ambassador Robert F. Godec for reasons 1.4 (b) and (d) -------------- SUMMARY -------------- ¶1. (C) Tunisia's official unemployment rate has hovered around 15 percent for almost forty years despite sustained GDP growth and continued GOT efforts to diversify the economy and promote investment that should spur new employment. Low domestic and international investment, as well as strict labor regulations, continue to restrict job creation. While high unemployment is not new for Tunisia, the face of unemployment has changed. Free public educational institutions continue to produce growing numbers of university graduates who can't find jobs. The result is a bubble of unemployed educated youth, who face poor economic and social prospects and could represent a threat to internal stability as they increasingly seek refuge in religion. The GOT is taking some cautious steps to stimulate economic growth, but officials may be betting on declining population growth as the permanent solution to its unemployment woes. End Summary. -------------- UNEMPLOYMENT HIGH... -------------- ¶2. (C) Tunisia has suffered from high unemployment for decades, with the official rate consistently fluctuating around fifteen percent. The 2006 national unemployment rate was 13.9 percent, but Tunisians of all societal classes argue that this figure dramatically underestimates a real rate which may reach 25-30 percent. A quick glance around Tunisia reveals coffee shops overflowing with young and middle-aged men who sit for hours around a cup of tea. One lower-income mother told PolOff that her twenty-four year old son had never found a job after high school, but takes money from her every day to go to coffee shops with his friends. Young women are also unemployed, but are more likely to do domestic chores at home while other family members work. Beyond official unemployment, underemployment remains a challenge, with many Tunisians employed in marginal labor, including shepherding, day labor and agriculture. ¶3. (C) Regardless of the actual rate, it is clear that unemployment is higher in certain regions and particular segments of the population. Economic growth in Tunisia has largely focused on the coastal regions, with export industries and tourism driving economic growth and employment. In the underdeveloped northwestern governorates (e.g., Beja, Jendouba),official unemployment hovers around 25 percent, and agriculture and public service continue to be the primary sources of employment. High rates of unemployment in these regions has led to the development of a cottage industry for domestic employees from rural areas. It has become a common practice for upper- and middle-class urban Tunisians to drive out to the northwestern towns and return the same day with a newly-hired maid or nanny. New domestics, who usually have high school degrees but may include university graduates, often earn less than $200/month, despite working unlimited hours as live-in help. -------------- AND HIGHER AMONG THE EDUCATED -------------- ¶4. (C) In fact, Tunisians with a university education are statistically more likely to be unemployed. Historically, it was the uneducated who were most likely to be unemployed. Today, the Ministry of Employment cites a two percent unemployment rate among high school graduates, while the official rate among university graduates is 16 percent. Although job creation for graduates is a GOT's priority -- and has been for years -- official statistics show that as many as forty percent of Tunisian university graduates aged 20-24 are unemployed. First time job seekers are particularly challenged, with the numbers of university graduates rising almost three-fold between 1997 (15,600 graduates) and 2006 (54,000 graduates). According to the World Bank, annual job creation is now approximately equal to the number of graduates (65-70,000),which suggests existing job creation is not sufficient to bring down the unemployment rate. -------------- THE ROOT CAUSES -------------- ¶5. (C) Despite some employment programs, the GOT has yet to figure out how to attract the domestic and private investment and related economic growth to spur significant job creation. The GOT has many incentives that have successfully attracted foreign investment that is labor intensive and export focused. However, Tunisia has yet to enjoy the large scale foreign investment that is seen elsewhere in the region. Limited investment also has a domestic component, as few Tunisians invest in high-employment enterprises, despite relatively low average wages (Ref A). The impact of low investment on employment is clear: the economy is not spurring much-needed job creation. ¶6. (C) Another challenge to job creation is the Tunisian labor market, which was based on the French model and is particularly rigid. Labor law and contracts are strict, and firing a contracted employee is nearly impossible. Increasingly, private companies have turned to temporary workers, in order to avoid providing benefits and to circumvent legal obstacles to firing employees. This is particularly true in the larger and more successful Tunisian sectors, such as tourism, which have been the source of most job creation in recent years. However, local unions are strong and exert pressure on the government to limit such loopholes. The result is that the risk-averse GOT is reluctant to engage in rapid economic liberalization that might result in worker displacement and higher unemployment. ¶7. (C) Free public education is partly the reason for the bubble of educated job seekers, as many Tunisians, particularly urban youth, are seeking advanced degrees. High education levels has thus driven up competition among new graduates. For example, in the information technology field, it is not uncommon for a Ph.D. to be demanded for an entry level position. There is also strong evidence that there is little link between fields of study and job opportunities, which had led to too many graduates in medicine and engineering, for example, for the domestic labor market to absorb. According to a WHO expert, Tunisia lacks qualified medical support staff, like nurses and technicians, although many doctors graduate each year. While some graduates choose underemployment, entering the service or hospitality industry despite having other professional or technical skills, others refuse to work until a position in their chosen field materializes. -------------- SOCIAL IMPACT -------------- ¶8. (C) While the more affluent can afford to be selective about their job options, the lack of employment opportunities, particularly for educated youth, is increasingly challenging Tunisian society, which for years after independence enjoyed rapid growth and improvements in standards of living. Young Tunisians complain that it feels like the country is moving backwards, as growing inflation cancels out wage increases and continued growth fails to create much needed jobs. Older Tunisians fear that idle youth will be more likely to turn to religious extremism if their future appears bleak. Many Tunisians opine that the lack of work has left more young women at home, watching conservative religious programming and choosing to wear the veil. Young men are waiting longer to marry, as it takes longer to find work and save the funds required to buy and furnish a residence before marriage. Anecdotal evidence suggests that men are increasingly looking for gainfully employed women who could contribute to family expenses. Yet Tunisian cultural norms may be slower to adapt. One young taxi driver boasted that he hoped to be so successful that he could afford to let his future wife be a homemaker. ¶9. (C) The difficulty in finding work is so great that some of the unemployed are looking for other avenues to express their frustration. In 2006, a handful of Tunisians created the "Union of Unemployed Graduates" to pressure the GOT to address their need for work. Other Tunisians, particularly the educated, are increasingly looking for employment in Europe and North America -- either to improve their own economic situation or that of their children. Almost ten percent of Tunisians currently live abroad, a community which supports further emigration. Some Tunisians lament that economic challenges are diminishing the nationalist sentiments that led citizens of the independence era reject emigration. Others fear that unemployment, when combined with political and social frustrations, could push youth to turn to religious extremism and even terrorism. -------------- GOT EFFORTS -------------- ¶10. (C) The challenge unemployment poses for Tunisian society is evident by the extent of the Government's attention to the issue. On an almost weekly basis, President Ben Ali is announcing a new program to foster job creation or provide job skills to graduates. Further, the GOT is increasingly focused on opportunities to "export" Tunisian labor as a solution to unemployment. The state-run Tunisian Employment Agency attempts to match overseas employment opportunities with qualified nationals, identifying over 20,000 positions in the past five years. The GOT also sends trained professionals to work in less developed countries, often funded by international development organizations. For example, in mid-2007 two hundred Tunisian doctors were sent to South Africa to fill a gap in the medical field. ¶11. (C) Domestically, the Eleventh Development Plan (Ref B) predicts that increasing GDP growth from an average of five percent in the past decade to more than six percent in the coming decade will reduce unemployment to approximately 10 percent by 2016. Failure to spur this growth could cause official unemployment among university graduates to exceed 25 percent, according to GOT estimates. The question remains how best to encourage job creation. Government officials argue that improved Maghreb integration and trade could be enough to generate an additional one or two percent annual GDP growth, but there is little indication that real integration will occur in the short term. The GOT also has programs to spur small and medium enterprise creation, but many would-be entrepreneurs find it hard to start a business without "connections." Further, perceptions of widespread corruption lead some to fear their success would only attract unwanted attention from those who want a share of the profits. -------------- COMMENT -------------- ¶12. (C) The GOT has long recognized that human resources are the country's greatest natural resource and provide the foundation of the country's continued development. At the same time, unemployment may be undermining the very foundation of Tunisia's modern society. While high unemployment is not a new phenomonenon in Tunisia, the new character of unemployment has raised the stakes. Today, Tunisia's unemployed are young, educated and facing uncertain prospects for the future -- a segment of the population susceptible to radical ideologies prevalent on some satellite TV channels and a potential source of recruitment for extremists. In the past gradual development was sufficient to support Ben Ali's social pact in which citizens traded their political rights for economic security. Tunisians are increasingly questioning the Government's ability to hold up its end of the deal. The GOT's strategy for slow, but steady, growth will not address these immediate challenges. ¶13. (C) The Government clearly wants to spur growth, but appears too risk averse to undertake any economic -- and political -- liberalization that might possibly pose a threat to regime stability. We continue to press for the steps that can reverse unemployment trends, but it is unclear if the GOT is sufficiently convinced that open markets are the cure. In fact, the slow pace of economic liberalization suggests that the GOT may be betting that declining population growth in the next generation will offer a permanent solution. With a current demographic growth rate of just over one percent, the percentage of Tunisians under 15 is already declining. End Comment. GODEC