Monday, January 9, 2012

More on Spain's Architects in Crisis



More data on the effect of the crisis on the profession, collected by the Architects' Union (Sindicato de Arquitectos) and reported today in the Barcelona newspaper La Vanguardia:
  • 4,000 Spanish architects have left the country to work abroad, 7.5% of the profession.
  • Many are recent graduates "who can't find anything here (in Spain), and are highly valued for their excellent preparation and adaptability," says Union President Ignacio Bisbal.
  • Most go to France, Germany,Great Britain and other European Union countries, where their architecture licenses are recognized.
  • The average salary for architects working abroad is 24,500 euros a year, compared to less than 16,000 in Spain.
  • An additional 14% of the profession has found work in other sectors.
  • The official unemployment figure for the profession after these subtractions is 26.7%, although Bisbal assures that the real figure is higher.
  • Behind the figures: Spain's real estate industry has gone from 920,000 housing starts in 2006 to 60,000 this year.
  • Oversupply: 3,000 new architects come out of Spain's architecture schools each year, and there are 60,000 registered architects in the country, 1 per 800 inhabitants, compared to 1 per 1,500 in Europe as a whole.
  • Architects with work have seen their earnings go down: 60% report income cuts of over 20%. 
  • 18% of working architects earn less than 12,000 euros a year, and only 6.2% earn over 27,000 a year.
See my related post yesterday:
Crisis Closes Half of Madrid's Architecture Studios

Chart above is meaningless, but you get the idea.

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