The European Union has plenty of areas for improvement. It should cope with the issue of social and economic inequality, as the social problems can destroy the Union. The riots in Greece, Spain, Portugal, etc. are vivid examples of it. Economic union is impossible without a social one. In the countries with a big level of social and economic inequality many people don’t have even an access to such key resources as education and health. If the countries don’t do anything with that, they lose human resources with affects the economic growth.
The current situation in the EU
The inequality in the sphere of education remains one of the most important problems of the European Union. The percent of the young people from poor families who has obtained the scientific degree varies from 41% on Malta to 6% in Poland, Czech Republic and Slovakia. It is also the result of the fact that young people stand in front of the choice either to go to study and become good professionals or to find a low-paid job and help their families. At the same time, the quantity of unemployed young people goes up to 34-35% in Portugal, 51% in Spain and 42% in Italy. It is worth mentioning, that the social background is an important factor in the sphere of education. In such countries as Bulgaria, Slovakia, Hungary, France, Luxemburg, Portugal, Germany the ability to get higher education mainly depends on their social background. If the person cannot afford to study at the university, he or she will never get a highly-paid job. In such a way, people from rich families get a good education and can apply for the jobs with a high salary which is not the case for poor ones. This fact increases the gap between the rich and the poor.
Measures to be taken
The European countries decided to take measures in order to improve the situation with the education and developed the European Employment strategy (2012), Social Investments Package (2013), programs within “HORIZON 2020” project. The European Union heavily supports the idea of informal and distant education. It will give the possibility to widen the circle of students from poor families who can get a higher education and count for a better job in future. The education has to become more accessible and affordable. If the governments of the countries manage to do that they will immediately see a positive impact on the economy of their countries. Anyway, the social and educational policy is in the hands of the countries themselves and the European Union cannot do the whole task instead of them.
