The State of the European Union. The European Parliament faces its most important elections yet

83 The recent past has shown that Europe has been anything but social. The EU crisis of recent years is primarily responsible for this situation. It poses the greatest threat to the European social model in the history of European integration. Drastic reform programmes were imposed on Member States, forcing countries to implement rigid austerity policies and deregulate their la- bour markets and collective bargaining systems. This particularly affected the countries where the troika had a presence. Therefore, when the economic expansion has reached all Member States, divergence still remains in some areas, specially employment. The 2018 Joint Employment Report ap- proved last March 15 th by the EPSCO 1 Council 1  Joint Employment Report 2018, as adopted by the EPSCO Council on 15th March 2018. Available at: https://ec.eu ropa.eu/social/main.jsp?advSearchKey=joint+employment+ report&mode=advancedSubmit&catId=22&policyArea=0&p olicyAreaSub=0&country=0&year=0 shows clear differences in this regard. The unem- ployment rates in Spain or Greece remain sig- nificantly high (respectively of 16.8% and 20.7%) compared to the ones in the Czech Republic (2.8%) or Germany (3.7%) (Q3- 2017). On the employment side, the rates of Germany (79,1%) and Sweden (81.8%) contrast the situa- tion in Greece or Italy (respectively 58.1% and 62.6%) (Q3-2017). “In many Member States, em- ployment rates have still some way to go to re- cover from the crisis and notably also to attain the Europe 2020 national targets” the Report says. The reforms held during the crisis also had implications for all the members of euro area: the eurozone’s reformed economic and fiscal policy architecture is socially imbalanced; new procedures, underpinned by sanctions, are uni- laterally aimed at budgetary consolidation and increased competitiveness. The “constitutional asymmetry” between a very advanced econom- ic integration fostered by the market and a Social Europe – naming the myth, preserving the model and taking concrete action Gero Maass and María Pallares