Graduates become the nouveau poor while craftsmen and farmers prosper

Even according to pre-memorandum data, Greece is turning into a “land of lost dreams” for young generations. According to research by the Economic Chamber, under Giannis Dragasakis and prominent Greek economists, poverty is changing its face in our country, which is discovering a new economic and social reality.

According to official data, the poverty problem in our country intensified in 2008 when 20% of the population (over 2mil people) was living under the poverty line, while half subsisted on an income of even less than 75% of this line.

Contrary to what went on in previous eras, it’s not the farmer or the low-level pensioner anymore that pose as the typical representation of the poor in our country.

On the contrary, the editors of the research conclude that lately poverty seems to be shifting from the elderly to young couples with children and even young workers.

Unemployment and elastic forms of employment (part time work, work contracts, etc.) have contributed to this as the research shows.

Even though they are cheap labor, their access to the market is difficult as the private sector has not been producing remarkable job positions for years now, while wages are being clipped from high insurance contributions to support a redistributing social security system where two employees work and contribute to support one pensioner.  

Worst of all is the fact that this sector does not offer positions to absorb young talented workers. So poverty is shifting from the less educated to the higher educated levels.

Lines of unemployed young people with high school diplomas or especially with degrees of no value for the market, remain on the outside or compromise with income-generating work with no particular perspective (sales, office work, insurance and banking).

On the other hand, it seems that laborers and technicians are on the rise (painters, electricians, plumbers, domestic helpers, baby sitters) due to the modern way of life, which has made them necessary and expensive (compared to the income of 20% of Greeks who are close to the poverty line).

Therefore, there is a shift of poverty from rural to urban areas. In earlier decades, the share of farmers in poverty was very high. Now it has been greatly reduced, both because of the aging population and the shrinking of the agricultural sector.