My proposal is as follows:
I have been registered with the Job Centre for 4 months and I am very actively looking for a new job. My advisor needs to do absolutely nothing, because I have already come to her with a detailed retraining programme. I had both the timetable for the exams for the new licences and the NPQs and the cost plan.
But, damn it: the consultant warned me that the institute would not cover any of the costs associated with the retraining. I was horrified, but aren't we going for active employment policy in this country? How can an unemployed person afford to retrain for 3000 euros?!??!!? that is impossible.
I therefore propose that for all those of us who are really active in solving our situation as unemployed people, the state subsidises at least 50% of the cost of retraining as a reward for active engagement. Because as an unemployed person, you are faced with a fact: either to spend your savings on food and a roof over your head, but thus remain without the desired retraining, thus significantly worsening your chances of getting a new and better job, or to spend your savings on retraining, but starve to death under the Savský Bridge.
My proposal is quite realistically feasible. The state should use the crisis to take a comprehensive approach to cutting public sector costs and then there will be enough to subsidise the really active jobseekers.
1. My retraining would cost something like 3000 euros, which is about 70% of the average gross2 public sector wage. So, if we cut state wages by about 20% and cut other, more systemic issues, there will be money for a really good active employment policy.
2.The fact is that out of the current 100000 registered unemployed, only a few % are actually actively working on their socio-economic situation. Personally, my mother-in-law told me that I am by far the most engaged jobseeker in my job centre. And indeed it is true: most of the unemployed are just sucking the state dry, first for that benefit and then for social assistance - to try to solve their problem, it is beyond them. That is why a lot of money would not be needed for these subsidies.
Personally, I am trying to get into a profession that is diametrically opposed to my basic formal education, just because I know that I will have a better chance of getting a job that way. It is not easy, but I am willing to learn and also to invest some of my own resources. For the unemployed, it is already surplus to requirements to dig with a pick instead of a shovel.
 
It does not seem fair to me that my case should be measured by the same yardstick as the cases of other unemployed people who actually invest nothing in solving their problem. The Job Centre should encourage self-initiative and self-involvement, and cases like mine, where the consultant cannot even keep up with me because of all my plans, should be specially rewarded in order to make it easier for us to get the right qualifications and therefore a better job.
I am saying that it would mean a great deal to me if the Institute would pay 50% of the necessary funds.