Eurostat: Cyprus’ rate of overqualified workers above EU average in 2023

Workers in Cyprus, both Cypriots as well as other EU and third country nationals, were more likely to be over-qualified for their job compared to other member states of the EU in 2023, according to Eurostat.

It said that Cyprus also had the highest shared of over-qualified workers from other EU countries in this period.

All three categories of workers saw a significant decrease in Cyprus in 2023 compared to 2022, while it dropped slightly in the EU.

However, women in Cyprus were far more likely to be overqualified for their work than men across all three categories in 2023.

At EU level, the overqualification rate was 39.4% for non-EU citizens (0.1 percentage points lower than in 2022) and 31.3% for citizens of the EU working in countries other than their own(-0.3 pp). By contrast, the over-qualification rate for nationals stood at 20.8%, 0.3 pp less than in the previous year.

In Cyprus, the overqualification rate for non-EU citizens in 2023 was 39.3% (-10.6 pp from 2022 and 49.9%), 43.1% for citizens of other EU countries (-5.1 pp from 48.2%), and 27.5% for Cypriots (-0.9 pp from 28.4%).

Among the EU countries, in 2023, the highest share of overqualified non-EU citizens was recorded in Greece (69.6%), Italy (64.1%) and Spain (56.0%).

For citizens of other EU countries, the highest shares of ove-qualified workers were recorded in Italy (45.1%), followed by Cyprus (43.1%) and Spain (42.3%).

Looking at the overqualification rates by sex, data shows that women represent higher overqualification rates than men.

In 2023, the overqualification rate among female non-EU citizens was 6.7 pp higher than the rate for male non-EU citizens. It was likewise 3.2 pp higher for citizens of other EU countries. For nationals, the rate for women was 1.2 pp higher than for men.

In Cyprus, the overqualification rate was much higher among women in 2023. The overqualification rate for women from third countries working in Cyprus was 15.8 pp higher than for men, 12.6 pp higher for women from other EU member states, and 5 pp higher for Cypriot women.