Decent work as a factor og involvement of different categories of employees in EU countries

This article examines the essence and role of decent work to ensure greater involvement in the work of different categories of workers in the context of the implementation of the UN Sustainable Development Goals, in particular Goal 8 "Decent work and economic growth". The main goal of the article is to study the role of decent work as a factor in attracting different categories of workers to work in EU countries. Decent work was defined by the ILO in 1999 as one based on the principles of freedom, equality, security and human dignity. According to the ILO, decent work covers four main dimensions: employment, social protection, workers' rights and social dialogue. To prove the influence of decent work on the engagement of different categories of workers, the results of the Sixth European Working Conditions Survey EWCS 2015 were used. This study identified seven aspects related to decent work that can influence engagement at work: physical environment, work intensity, quality working hours, social environment, skills and judgment, prospects and wages. The results of the study showed that dependent self-employed persons have more unstable working conditions than the rest of the professional categories according to most of the analyzed indices. In this context, it is important to approve minimum standards at the EU level to ensure decent work in various industries and regions. It was concluded that the provision of decent work can become not only a tool for achieving the relevant UN Sustainable Development Goal (Goal 8), but also an effective economic stimulus to increase the level of employment of the population, which had negative trends in recent years due to the COVID-19 pandemic and the beginning of a full-scale war in Ukraine