(19 May 32016) – More than a fifth (22.4%) of all part-time workers and 4.6% of total employment in the EU in 2015 were under-employed, meaning they wished to work more hours and were available to do so. Two-thirds were women.
A majority of part-time workers aged 15 to 74 wished to work more hours while being available to do so in Greece (71.8%), Cyprus (68.0%) and Spain (54.2%), closely followed by Portugal (46.4%).
At the opposite end of the scale, Denmark (9.5%), the Czech Republic (9.6%), Estonia (12.0%), Luxembourg (13.2%), the Netherlands (13.4%) and Germany (14.0%) registered the smallest shares of underemployed part-time workers.
The potential additional labour force also varied significantly between Member States, with the largest proportion registered by far in Italy (with more than 3.5 million persons, equivalent to 14.0% of the labour force), ahead of Croatia (9.2%), Luxembourg (7.8%), Finland (7.7%) and Bulgaria (7.1%).
Women made up the largest part of the total potential additional labour force in a vast majority of EU Member States, with the exceptions of Ireland, Bulgaria, Lithuania, Denmark, Finland, Hungary and Austria.