Only one of ten Romanians totally agree that their present workplace offers them a high income or high chances of promotion.

According to the study Attitudes towards Work in Romania, launched on Thursday, December 11 2008 by the Soros Foundation Romania, the Romanians’ perception towards their present workplace is marked by the following attributes: safety and social utility, but low incomes and low chances of promotion.

“The positioning on the first place of the need concerning the safety of the workplace is not surprising at all, considering the relatively recent experience of mass discharges in the ex-public companies or the private ones”- explains the sociologist Mircea ComÅŸa, co—author of the study.

Analysing the distance between real and ideal concerning the features of the workplace, 78% of the employed persons declared that they prefer to a great extent a safe job, but only 38% consider that their present job is very safe; 68% consider that it is very important for a job to offer a high income, but only 10% totally agree that their job provides them this kind of income.

Accordingly, at least 40% of the employed persons are in the situation in which their need of safety is not accomplished; even more (58%) are in the situation in which their job doesn’t offer them incomes according to their wishes. Also, the distance between real and ideal is of 32% when talking about the chances of promotion feature, 21% when talking about the interesting job feature and below 10% when talking about the other features.

The Romanians would prefer to a significantly greater extent to work for somebody else (63%), rather than on their own (30%), respectively to work in a big company (54%) than in a small one. Also, half of the adult population would like to work for a public company (51%) while only 37% prefer a private one.

The data of the research show that, in reality, the majority of the employed persons (88%) work as employees for someone and only a small part (12%) are owners or work on their own. A bit more of half of these persons work in a big company (over 50 employees) and the rest in small companies (maximum 50 employees). A third of the Romanians work in public companies and two thirds in private ones (more than two thirds of them work in private companies with Romanian capital, the rest with mixed or foreign capital).

The majority of the employees in Romania declare themselves satisfied of their job. Thus, 13% say that they are completely satisfied of their job, 18% very satisfied, 47% satisfied enough and only 16% declare they are neither satisfied nor unsatisfied (the rest of 6% are unsatisfied). From the total of those who declare themselves  completely or very satisfied of the job, men have a degree of satisfaction a bit higher comparing to women, the satisfaction tends to increase with the age, level of education and social status, it is maximum in the case of the owners (58% are very or completely satisfied of their job) and slightly over average in Bucharest.   Comparing to other countries, Romania is situated at the end of the top, together with other ex-communist countries (Slovenia, Hungary, Bulgaria, the Czech Republic) but also with Japan or France.

Although those working in the Romanian private sector spend the greatest amount of time at work ( 9 hours and 20 minutes on average), they enjoy more flexibility, concerning both the working program and the manner of organizing the working day, having easily the possibility to solve a personal problem during work program.

At the other extreme are the employees in the public sector, who spend the least amount of time at work (8 hours and 47 minutes), but who have less flexibility in establishing the work program and more difficulties in leaving from work to solve personal problems
The employees of the private institutions with mixed or foreign capital situate themselves between the two groups mentioned above, from both points of view.

More than half of the employed persons (53%) declare that they often go home tired from work. The percentage is higher in the case of those who work in Romanian private institutions (57%) and lower in the case of those who work in public institutions (only 47%).

Comparing to other countries, Romania has a remarkable position (4 rank out of 33 countries) concerning the percentage of employees who often go home very tired from work.
Nevertheless, concerning the participation rate of the employed population at programs of professional development, with a percentage of 25% Romania finds itself- in the international context- on the position 28 out of 33 countries.

The results of the research show that the average income of women is lower than the average income of men. More specifically, the average income of the women who work in the public sector represents 85% of the men’s average income, while in the private sector the women’s average income represents 79% of that of men.

Approximately 16% of the employed population of Romania states that, in the last year, it either worked without a workman’s pass or had on it a lower salary than the real one, or it had to confront with both situations.

The results suggest that the chances for a person to be in one of the two situations above increase if that person is at the beginning of the career(the lack of experience at negociating with the employers is doubled by the reserve of the latter in hiring persons who lack experience, a situation which makes the employers “braver” in offering “alternative” solutions), if the person has a low level of education (a case in which he has less to offer to the employer) or if the person lives in the rural area (where the lack of jobs can make the employee to accept the conditions imposed by the employer).  

The authors of the study remark the fact that both situations are most often encountered in Bucharest: 14% work without a workman’s pass while 18% receive a higher salary than that written in the workman’s pass.

The private companies with a Romanian capital seem to be more inclined towards the two types of behaviour: 14% of their employees work without having a workman’s pass and 18% work for a lower salary than the real one written in the workman’s pass.

Approximately 5% of the employees in the public sector state that they were in one of these situations in the last year, “which is somehow surprising, because for the public  companies the percentage should be zero”, says the sociologist Claudiu TufiÅŸ, co-author of the study.

The study “Attitudes towards Work in Romani” is based on the results of two opinion polls developed between 4-24 May 2008.The first poll, with a sample of 2.400 persons is representative for the adult population. "Attitudes towards work in Romania" is based on two polls carried out in 4-24 May 2008. The first poll, with a sample of some 2.400 respondents, is respresentative for the adult noninstitutionalized population of Romania, and has an error margin of  ±2%. The second one, with a sample of some 1.000 respondents, is respresentative for the Roma population of Romania, and has an error margin of ±3%.  For both polls, data gathering and introduction have been carried out by  The Gallup Organization România.

Research instruments (sample, questionnaire), statistics and data analysis are the result  of the project team's work: Mircea ComÅŸa, Cosima RughiniÅŸ, Claudiu TufiÅŸ, Ovidiu Voicu (Program Manager, Soros Foundation).

The study is available online here (in Romanian).