"Governments need to take quick and decisive action to avoid the financial crisis becoming a fully-blown social crisis with scarring effects on vulnerable workers and low income households," OECD Secretary-General Angel Gurría told Labor and Employment Ministers at the G8 Social Summit in Rome on March 30.

Gurria said the financial crisis threatens to put an additional 25 million workers in OECD countries out of a job by 2010. Worldwide unemployment could rise by 40 million, he warned.

He said the most disadvantaged groups in society - young people, unskilled workers, immigrants, and temporary workers were bearing the brunt of the crisis. Restoring economic growth, he added, is not just a political and economic priority but also an ethical and moral imperative.

The OECD Secretary-General called for additional spending on employment programs and social security, noting that the United States spends just 0.2 percent of its GDP on income support to the unemployed.

He said governments should consider subsidizing firms facing short term difficulties in order to finance short term working programs and avoid "inefficient and socially costly" layoffs.

Gurria also noted that in a number of countries, temporary working, contract working and other non-standard patterns of employment were becoming prevalent and that a growing section of the workforce is no longer eligible for regular unemployment benefits. He indicated that this was a structural problem in the labor market that countries need to address.

(China.org.cn by John Sexton March 31, 2009)