months in Moldova?’
Source: SLMT
Although finding a job is not very difficult, the connection between the labour market and the education system appears to be weak. This weakness is demonstrated by, among other things, the fact that for most of the graduates the first jobs following the transition from education to work had little to do with their core specialisms. The first job did not correspond with the field of study in which they graduated for 32.4% of graduates (Table 19). This was most often the case for secondary professional graduates and post-secondary non-tertiary graduates.
The largest proportion of graduates whose first job did not correspond to the field of study in which they graduated was from engineering, industry and construction, and business, law and social sciences fields (Table 20). There may be different reasons for this. Graduates of business, law and social sciences may work in other areas because of the large number and oversupply of these graduates. However, in the case of engineering and industry graduates, these are mainly from
vocational schools, and as a result of the low quality of their education and sometimes the low salaries offered, they are unable to find a job that corresponds to the field of study in which they graduated.
Table 19. Graduates by highest level of education attained and the correspondence between their first job and the field of study in which they graduated (N=152)
Highest level of education Did your first job correspond to your field of study?
Yes No
Secondary professional 27 7
Post-secondary non-tertiary 25 20
Higher 45 18
Post-graduate 7 3
Source: SLMT
Table 20. Graduates by field of study in which they graduated and the correspondence between their first job and the field of study in which they graduated (N=151)
Field of study graduated Did your first job correspond to your field of study?
Yes No
Education 11 2
Humanities and arts 5 3
Social sciences, business and law 20 10
Sciences, mathematics and computing 6 5
Engineering, manufacturing and construction 22 16
Agriculture and veterinary sciences 5 2
Health and social welfare 8 2
Services 19 6
Other 8 2
Source: SLMT
The proportion of graduates who had work experience did not differ much in terms of their area of residence. However, there were important differences between urban and rural residents in terms of the education they acquired and the type of first job. For instance, students from rural areas were more inclined to enrol in secondary vocational education than higher education, and the employment opportunities were different for them. Around 55% of graduates from urban areas had a job that corresponded to their field of study, compared with 50% of graduates from rural areas, who were mostly employed in the agricultural, construction and trade sectors.
Moreover, there was a significant difference between women and men in terms of the correspondence between their first job and their core specialism. As a result of different preferences in fields of study, with more women than men choosing education, humanities and arts, and services, the first job corresponded to the specialism in 60% of cases for women, but in only 46% of cases for men.
Despite the large proportion of graduates who had found a job that did not correspond to their core specialism, only 40% of them considered that they needed additional training in order to fulfil the obligations of their first job, almost the same proportion as those whose field of work coincided with their graduation field. Most of these graduates (75%) were trained within the workplace.
For most graduates (60%) their first job was a position requiring ‘high’ or ‘medium’ qualifications.
Around 33% of respondents said that their first job was a low-skilled one, even though many of them (31 out of the 72 who responded) had graduated from upper secondary or tertiary education
institutions. It is interesting that around 7% of the graduates were appointed to senior or middle-level managerial positions in their first jobs. It should be mentioned that this trend is seen mainly in the IT sector, where companies are employing young specialists who have more advanced technical and marketing skills. Another explanation for the large number of graduates holding senior positions as their first job is the fact that many of them are either self-employed (mostly in IT or business consultancy and other related sectors) or have started their own business.
Interviews have shown that the main factor deterring companies from employing more young specialists and paying them the desired salary is their lack of experience. The sociological survey confirmed this: of the barriers faced by the young specialists while searching for a job, the lack of experience was quoted the most frequently (21% of respondents), while a lack of information about available vacancies was the second most frequently given answer. More than 63% of the graduates had accumulated no work experience while studying. Of those who had some work experience, in most cases (around 60%) this was not related to the area of their core specialism.
Internships and the opportunity to work part-time while studying are obvious ways for young people to address the problem of lack of experience. However, it seems that most students either ignored or were unable to undertake these activities. The ‘internships’ that students in Moldova must fulfil in their final years of study was inherited from the Soviet system and is so formal that it is ridiculed both by students and by companies that offer it. There are some legal regulations regarding internships. For instance, according to the Law on Education, companies with public capital and with 20 or more employees are obliged to take interns from secondary professional education institutions. However, these types of regulation are not taken seriously because they are not adequately enforced by the government. Moreover, there is no serious commitment on the part of companies to create real conditions for internships, nor on the part of students and universities to set up and achieve clear
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objectives. In most cases there is no continuity between the theoretical material learnt in school and the practical tasks that students perform during internships. In other cases, because they have only been trained to use older equipment, interns are simply not allowed to use advanced equipment, since employers fear they may break it.
The average length of the first job identified in the transition module was around 30 months, but this included individuals who were still in their first position. Interviews with employers reveal that young employees do not usually remain in their first jobs for more than two years. The most intense
‘outmigration’ of the young specialist is from in public services and public administration. Salaries in these sectors are lower than in the private sector or in programmes implemented by international organisations, and young specialists accept public sector jobs only to gather the necessary two to three years’ experience that is necessary in order to obtain a better-paid job. The working agreement usually takes the form of a full-time long-term contract.
One important conclusion is that the transition from school to the labour market is to a significant degree affected by migration. Many graduates have parents or other relatives working abroad for relatively long periods of time. A number of factors enable graduates nowadays to leave the country more freely than the first waves of migrants, but the two most important factors are the social networks for the mutual help of those who migrate, and the multiple citizenship that many graduates hold. As a result of this, today’s graduates are looking for much higher entry salaries than did previous cohorts.
According to results of the survey, young people graduating in 2007–2008 would accept in their first job, on average, a minimum wage of MDL 3,650 (roughly USD 380) which is 75% higher than the average monthly wage in Moldova. Some companies are able to pay such salaries, but most are not.
Interviews conducted with employers show that they are not satisfied with the quality of work that young employees usually deliver for such a salary. Because of the small sample, no clear link between the reservation wage and educational level was discovered, although those graduating from universities tended to look for higher salaries.
3. Restructuring labour markets and changing employment patterns
3.1 The macroeconomic situation and economic restructuring
3.1.1 From economic decline to economic rebound
Moldova’s GDP has followed a U-shaped trajectory over the period 1991–2007, though it still has far to go to recover its 1990 level of production (Chart 29). In 2007 total output was only 52% of the 1990 level. With an average GDP growth of 5.5%, it is unlikely that Moldova will recover its pre-transition level of output until 2019–2020.