Employment, Energy, Estonia, Legislation, Markets and Companies

"The laid off workers who have received aid from state support measures should be compared to those who have taken action on their own. This requires a detailed study of the jobs people actually take up so as to understand whether and how state measures to create jobs and provide labor market services to the unemployed dovetail," the National Audit Office said.

The auditors also say that it is important to understand why in certain cases people fail to find work and whether steps taken by the government or a prompt change of existing practice would help improve the situation.

A spell of redundancies, which entrepreneurs attributed to extremely unfavorable economic conditions rose to the fore as an acute labor market problem in the largely industrial northeastern region in the middle of this year. The fertilizer maker Nitrofert, energy group Eesti Energia and some other industrial enterprises planned to lay off around 1,000 people in the second half of 2015.