Hundreds of thousands of EU jobs at risk, Commission to warn

EU countries risk mass job losses in the coming years as high energy costs, industrial restructuring and the green transition weigh on the economy, the European Commission is set to warn.

The figures, seen by POLITICO, will appear in the European Semester Spring Package, which sets out the Commission’s economic and policy recommendations for EU countries and is due to be presented Wednesday. They underscore growing concern in Brussels about the scale of the economic challenges facing the bloc.

“Europe’s competitiveness will not be built by technology, capital or financial regulation alone,” Commission Executive Vice President for Skills Roxana Mînzatu told POLITICO. “It will be built by people, the skills they develop and the opportunities we create for them to contribute fully to our economies and societies.”

With the U.S.-Israeli war in Iran showing no sign of ending and continuing to affect oil prices, the Commission projects that energy price pressures in 2026 will put as many as 560,000 jobs at risk. The sectors most exposed include construction, metals, chemicals and transport.

Weaker economic activity has forced the Commission to revise its joblessness projections. Last autumn, the Commission predicted that unemployment would stand at 5.9 percent in 2026 and 5.8 percent in 2027. It now believes it will be 6 percent in both years.

The Commission also expects governments to take on more debt, with the general government balance for all 27 EU countries widening from -3.1 percent of GDP in 2025 to -3.5 percent in 2026 and -3.6 percent in 2027.