Photo taken from the platform Freepik.

Ronald T., a fifty-year-old man from Vienna, has been tirelessly trying to find new employment for almost three years now, but despite all his efforts, he remains jobless.

Since July 2022, when he lost his job, he has sent as many as six hundred and forty applications, but not a single one resulted in a positive response. He described his situation in an interview for the Austrian portal Heute, emphasizing that he is not the only one facing such challenges.

Ronald has seventeen years of work experience behind him, and throughout his career he continuously improved his skills and pursued further education. He worked at a healthcare institution in the Austrian federal state of Burgenland, and later received additional training in the field of criminal data analysis and open-source investigation, writes Fenix Magazin.

However, health problems forced him to interrupt his career, which led to a gap in his CV. Ronald believes that this very fact significantly reduces his chances on the labor market. In addition, until last year he was receiving rehabilitation benefits, which could also negatively affect the perception of potential employers.

He is currently looking for a job in administration, and it is important to him that there is an option to work from home or that he be in the office no more than three days a week. What would suit him best is a stable position that would allow him to return to a daily work routine. In addition to financial reasons, Ronald points out that long-term unemployment also represents a major emotional burden for him.

A similar situation is also present on the German labor market, where the number of unemployed people continues to rise. According to data from the Federal Employment Agency, in May the number of unemployed decreased by only twelve thousand, which is a weak result for the spring period that usually brings improvements. The total number of unemployed in Germany now stands at two million nine hundred and nineteen thousand, which is almost two hundred thousand more than in the same period last year. The unemployment rate currently stands at six point two percent. Andrea Nahles, the agency's chairwoman, emphasized that the labor market is showing no signs of recovery and that a further rise in unemployment is expected during the summer months.