The workers of the European Union who enter the labor market today will have a working life of 36.5 years on average, but there are important differences depending on the country: while the Dutch will work 43 and a half years, the Romanians -those who work the least years- will do so for 31 years and six months, according to data published last week by Eurostat based on activity rates.

The Nordic countries, including the three European Free Trade Association (EFTA) countries, consisting of Iceland, Norway and Switzerland, have the longest durations, over 40 years of working life: Iceland (45.4 years), the Netherlands (43.2 years), Sweden (42.6 years), Switzerland (42.0 years), Norway (41.2 years), Denmark (41.0 years) and Estonia (40.3 years) occupy the top positions.

By contrast, the shortest durations of working life are registered in Romania (31.5 years) and several southern European countries: Italy (32.2 years), Bulgaria (33.6 years), Greece (33.9 years), Croatia and Serbia, both with 34.0 years.

One of the factors that conditions the duration of the working career is the pension system that exists in each country.. Thus, for example, in the Netherlands, which holds the EU record for longest working careers, a pay-as-you-go system is combined in which access to a public pension is available from the age of 67 (similar to ours), with employment pension plans (within the company) and which in practice represent 70% of the total amount received at retirement.. Extending working life serves to ensure a certain level of income at the time of retirement.

On the contrary, in Romania, the pension system allows access to retirement at an early age, despite the fact that this same year it has been delayed until 63 years of age for women and 65 years of age for men. Given that workers manage to accumulate the years of contributions necessary to access the public pension earlier, they have an incentive not to continue with their working lives.

In Spain, working life expectancy stood at 36 years in 2022, its highest level in the historical series, since for example in 2021 it was estimated that Spaniards would work on average 35 years and 8 months before accessing retirement. We work more years than in other Mediterranean countries -such as Italy and Greece-, but less than they do in France (there they work 7 months more on average), Portugal (where they work two more years) or Germany (where the working life lasts 3 years and 3 months more).

The labor career in Spain has grown in the last two decades, since in the year 2000 it stood at an average of 30 years and 10 months, so that those who entered the labor market at the age of 25, retired on average at 55. In 22 years, careers have been extended by six years. In the EU average, the increase in the same period has been lower, four years, going from 32.3 to 36.5 years.

In Lithuania and Estonia women work longer

In addition to important geographical differences, the Eurostat data reflects a gender gap in terms of the length of working careers: men work more years, on average, than women, with the exception of Lithuania and Estonia, the only two countries in which women have longer working careers than men, 1.5 years and 9 months, respectively.. In Finland and Latvia there is hardly any gender difference.

On average in the EU, women have a working life of 34 years, compared to the 38 and a half years that men work, four more years. In Spain, the difference is almost four years: women work 34 years and men 37 years and 10 months.

There are extreme cases, in which women have working careers of less than thirty years, such as Romania, where they work for an average of 28 years, or Italy, with 27 and a half years; or where men are close to fifty years of working life, such as Iceland (37 years) or the Netherlands (where they exceed 45 years).

The longest lengths of working life for women, i.e. over 37 years, are found in Sweden (41.4 years), the Netherlands (41.1), Estonia (40.7), Finland (39.7), Denmark (39.4), Lithuania (38.1), Germany and Portugal (both 37.4 years), as well as in the EFTA countries: Iceland (43.7 years), Switzerland (39.8 years) and Norway (39.7 years).

Spain is one of the sunniest countries in Europe. Its approximately 2,500 hours of sunshine per year, comparable to those of Turkey, Italy, Greece, France and Portugal, invite you to make use of its full potential and one of the possibilities it offers is to merge the energy of the sun's rays with another of the country's strong points, the agri-food sector -which has a contribution of more than 111 billion euros to GDP and represents 9.2%-. This symbiosis has a name: agrovoltaic, a concept that seeks to take advantage of the synergies between both fields and take advantage of the same area of land both to obtain solar energy and agricultural products, that is, solar panels coexist with crops on the same surface, or even with livestock.. “Only with 1% of arable land also dedicated to the production of solar energy, it would be possible to compensate the world demand for energy”, concludes a study published by the journal Nature, which means that the more you bet on renewables, the more you contribute to curbing climate change, one of the great threats to the agricultural sector.

This concept, which began to be considered in the 1980s, has gained strength in recent years as the commitment to sustainability has been strengthened, since it seeks to establish synergies between the agricultural and energy sectors through more efficient and shared use of land.. There are several ways to achieve this: the most common is to use fixed support systems to raise the solar panels between two and five meters above the cultivated or grazing land.. Thus, machinery and animals can access the crops or pastures located below them. But there are also other options, since solar panels can be installed on the roof of a greenhouse.

Although it may sound striking a priori, the combination of both uses of the same land offers interesting benefits. Regarding the environment, the reduction in the emission of greenhouse gases in the agricultural sector stands out. But, in addition, the use and double use of land for agriculture and energy alleviates the pressure on ecosystems and biodiversity, which can coexist with these energy facilities in symbiosis.

But that's not all, since the deployment of solar panels can help limit the evaporation of water in crops, which reduces the water needs of the land. For their part, they also help protect crops from atmospheric phenomena such as hail, frost, downpours or heat waves and droughts, since a reduction in wind loads and solar radiation can contribute to lower water consumption, and can be shelter for animals.

Following this philosophy of making land use compatible, experts from Chonnam National University (South Korea) launched a pioneering study and planted broccoli under solar panels. The results show that the flavor is identical and also its nutritional properties. The panels were raised between two and three meters and turned at an angle of 30º to provide water and shade for the crops. There are numerous examples, most of them developed in the Netherlands and Germany, focusing on wheat, potato, celery, blueberries, red currants, raspberries, strawberries and blackberries. In these locations, it has been shown that, during hot days, the conditions under the panels were between two and five degrees Celsius cooler compared to traditional cultivation methods. Closer by, in the French Upper Saxony region, 5,500 panels have been distributed on a farm in the Amance commune and soybeans are already being harvested under its shade. There are also examples of its usefulness with olive trees in Sicily, peach trees and vines in France, and artichokes and peppers in Murcia.

Juan Béjar (Madrid, 1957) says that the energy sector is the most exciting of all those he has traveled through. The comment, coming from a veteran of the industrial landscape who has held management positions in close to a dozen companies, does not pass

“Regulate conflicts of interest more effectively in the face of the revolving door phenomenon, precisely setting the conditions of incompatibility for the persons concerned and toughening the sanctions for non-compliance”.

This is how the first electoral program of the PSOE of Pedro Sánchez read in 2019. Over the years, territorial quotas, awards for personal loyalty and the rescue of senior positions in territories lost to the PP are the three keys on which Sánchez's policy to occupy large public companies has been based in the last four years.. The revolving doors haven't stopped. In this world there are hundreds of billions of euros at stake, in addition to the power provided by strategic sectors such as transport, communication, energy or defense. There are also very relevant ones such as Jesús Huerta's (former Minister of Finance in Andalusia) gambling in the State Lotteries, the communications in Hispasat, chaired by the former mayor of Barcelona, Jordi Hereu -the only one who does not publish his salary- or directly considered a prize, such as Paradores for Pedro Saura (former State Secretary of José Luis Ábalos in Development) or the Hipódromo de la Zarzuela. If it were necessary to personalize the finger that has appointed most of the senior positions in the last four years, it would be those of Pedro Sánchez himself, Salvador Illa, president of the PSC and María Jesús Montero, Minister of Finance. The three, each according to their criteria, have removed and placed high positions.

MAIL:

Juan Manuel Serrano, former chief of staff of Pedro Sánchez and with a salary of 208,513 euros, was the warning that the commitment of the revolving doors in 2019 was worthless. Chief of staff of the Federal Executive Commission of the PSOE, his loyalty to Pedro Sánchez earned him a high position in a public company. It was in July 2018, just a month and a half after the motion of censure that unseated the PP government. In these four years, Serrano has maintained a bitter struggle with the unions of the company with the most employees in the public sector, 49,000, who point to him for having neither experience nor ability to run the company, much less take charge of its transformation.. Serrano leaned on a strategy director, Avelino Castro, who further inflamed the social situation in the company. After his departure, he appointed Enrique Cervera, former spokesman for the Junta de Andalucía in the presidency of Manuel Chaves and from the EFE news agency, as his successor.. Serrano is, according to the UGT and CCOO unions, the cause of the company accumulating losses of 1,000 million since he assumed the presidency.

INDRA

In May 2021, the Indra board forced the replacement of its executive president, Fernando Abril Martorell, to cede the position to Marc Murtra, an industrial engineer, former CEO of Red.es, Joan Clos' chief of staff at the Ministry of Industry and the highest salary of those chosen by Sánchez, with 586,000 euros.. April Martorell had given a strong boost to the transformation of the technology and defense company. The coup was not definitive because Murtra assumed the presidency without executive powers. But it would be completed a year later in a new assault by SEPI in collaboration with the Amber activist fund -commanded by the also president of the Prisa group, Joseph Oughourlian- and the Basque defense group SAPA. The operation took away no less than five independent directors and left the market regulator, the CNMV and its president, Rodrigo Buenaventura, in a compromised situation for not intervening beyond censoring maneuvers that ignored the codes of good practice.

RENFE

In the Government of Pedro Sánchez, Renfe belongs to the orbit of the Socialist Party of Catalonia (PSC) led by Salvador Illa. Actually, the PSC is a quota that is extended to other companies of the Ministry of Transport directed by Raquel Sánchez and that has another exhibition in Aena, chaired by Maurici Lucena. But if the airport manager knew how to overcome the pandemic and not give a startle, it was not like that at Renfe. Before Raül Blanco, Renfe was assigned to Isaías Táboas, with a salary of 180,000 euros. To his then minister, José Luis Ábalos, Táboas's resume to lead a public railway operator with 13,000 workers on the verge of liberalization seemed the best: Murtra's predecessor as cabinet director of the Ministry of Industry with Joan Clos, Montilla's right-hand man in the Generalitat and Secretary of State for Transport until 2011 with José Blanco in Fomento when Blanco himself put an end to the era of pharaonic infrastructures with that one famous phrase “we have lived beyond our means”. Táboas resigned in February due to the scandal of the commission to the CAF company of trains for a value of 258 million euros that did not fit through the tunnels of the network. But he has remained a director of the company's subsidiaries. His replacement is Raül Blanco, also a senior position of the PSC, Secretary General of Industry and SMEs with Reyes Maroto until December 2022, when he was relieved after the failure of the automotive PERTE.

REDEIA

Beatriz Corredor, property registrar and former Minister of Housing in the Government of José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero was part of the group that supported Pedro Sánchez in the formation of the new PSOE executive. But, although she appeared on the lists for deputy for Madrid, Sánchez called her to replace Jordi Sevilla at the head of Red Eléctrica in February 2020, just formed his Government. With a salary of 546,000 euros at the head of Redeia, which includes other companies such as Hispasat, chaired by the former mayor of Barcelona Jordi Heréu, Corredor has launched the transformation of the company to diversify its activity towards other sectors that are not energy. With 546,000 euros received in 2022, his salary is next to that of the president of Indra, Marc Murtra, the highest of the senior positions appointed by Sánchez.

RACECOURSE

The Hipódromo de la Zarzuela, in Madrid, is a company belonging to SEPI and State Lotteries and Betting whose purpose is to reactivate the horse racing sector and promote an economic activity that highly creates employment and performs important social work, as explained by the company itself in its list of purposes. Maritcha was called a month later to occupy the presidency of the Hippodrome despite the fact that the previous president had barely been in office for a year, which is paid with 113,000 euros.

ENAGAS

The energy operator is a listed company that has BlacRock and Amancio Ortega as its main shareholders.. together with SEPI. It is the reason that his council is highly politicized, with the presence of former Zapatero ministers, José Blanco and José Montilla, both with a salary of 160,000 euros and a record of independents, such as the former PP minister, Ana de Palacio, or Cristóbal Gallego, adviser to Podemos.. Arturo Gonzalo Aizpiri is the CEO. Closely linked to the PSOE, his position will be more than doubtful in the event of a change of government

Intense weekend with the elections and a heat in which one would prefer to lock oneself in the cinema for three hours with good air conditioning to see Christopher Nolan's Oppenheimer. It is curious to reflect on a Sunday like today about the public company and to think of that controversial scientist as the director of one of the most knowledge-intensive public projects and, at the same time, the most destructive for humanity.. If you are wondering why public companies should or should not exist, think about the end (social and not just financial efficiency) and the means.. It always works as expected. Oppenheimer faced the monumental task of leading a group of scientists in the development of the first nuclear bomb.. Despite the critical and urgent nature of the project, it was not exempt from government red tape.. From equipment delays to tensions with military leaders. Paradoxically, the project was a private success and a public aberration.

I remember those 1980s when the scent of liberalization -not necessarily liberalism- permeated advanced economies around the world.. In 1985, while we were watching Marty McFly from Back to the Future in theaters, Spain began an intense privatization process. Since then, more than 120 companies have gone through this process, and from there emerged other important corporations that today are listed on the stock market.. Now the concept of a company, its taxation and the need for state ownership have once again been intensely debated.

To banish myths, let's start by pointing out that Spain is one of the EU countries with the least weight of public corporations. Even so, there are transport, mail or, especially, communication companies in the hands of the State whose income statement is not promising. Even though the majority of ownership is public, they must be managed by recognized professionals and follow efficiency criteria.. If we take the data and analyze the situation in Spain, we find that private companies have greater economic and financial profitability. The public ones appear as more solvent and with greater liquidity. Of course, to what extent this is achieved with the taxpayer's pocket or due to lack of competition should be clarified.

In any case, that wave of privatization that intensified in the 1990s under the so-called Washington Consensus has left lessons that should still be considered in Spain today.. The studies that were carried out more than twenty years ago in our country clearly showed that those large public corporations (including some banks) were not efficient and pale in comparison with other private ones.. However, something more than nuances has also been evidenced. The first, that there is no “one size” (one size does not fit all). Private companies are not always more efficient than public ones nor do they provide the same advantages to the citizen. On the other hand, a public company is not governed only by financial criteria. Also, public companies may lack the incentives of private companies due to a lack of competition or compensation structure.. Finally, in some cases, privatizations have led to improvements in efficiency and service.. In others, they have resulted in job loss, higher rates, or decreased quality of service.. It should be clearly distinguished that liberalizing is not always suppressing the public. In many cases, state-owned companies in any proportion can be there, but compete with other private providers.

Finally, the debate should not be carried too far.. The public company is not the same as the public service. In a country like Spain, services such as health have proven to work much better than private ones and, although they have a wide margin for improvement, they have avoided large-scale social problems observed in countries with almost total liberalization of these services.