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OpenAI is very clear that ads on ChatGPT are going to work. So much so that they are going to charge more than TV for them, according to The Information

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A few days ago we knew that OpenAI was going to draw up a plan to insert advertising in ChatGPT. Now, according to they point Sources from The Information, the company is already establishing the rates that it is going to start charging advertisers, and the truth is that they are going to give something to talk about. The media shares that OpenAI asks for approximately $60 per 1,000 impressions (CPM), a very high figure when compared to other media, including television. The problem is that OpenAI does not yet offer anywhere near the same measurement tools as Google or Meta. The price thing. The figure of 60 dollars is at NFL levels, according to reflects Gennaro Cuofano, founder of The Business Enquineer. OpenAI has not yet specified what data it will provide to advertisers, only that it will be “high level”, so there is some skepticism if we take into account that companies like Meta and Google allow us to track very specific and detailed metrics when we see an ad through their platforms. Vender access, without results. The company is betting for capitalizing on its audience of more than 400 million users before building the necessary infrastructure to offer this type of service. As Cuofano details, it’s about “selling reach now, building attribution later,” similar to what Facebook did in 2010, when it had a massive, fast-growing audience and opted for ads without yet an advanced metrics infrastructure. Time has ended up proving Zuckerberg’s platform right, but we will have to wait to see if the move is worth the same to OpenAI. Nfinancial need. The strategy can also be seen as an attempt by OpenAI to reverse the economic situation through which it passes. And as we knew through internal documents, the company projects operating losses of $74 billion by 2028, driven largely by AI operational costs. The idea is that the ads appear in the coming weeks only for free and download users. Go plan in the United States, while Plus, Pro, Business and Enterprise subscriptions will be free of advertising. OpenAI affirms that the ads will not influence the chatbot’s responses and that it will never sell conversation data to advertisers, in addition to avoiding sensitive topics such as mental health or politics. And now what. OpenAI will now have to demonstrate that it can scale this model beyond experimental budgets. And to scale a platform towards revenues that exceed tens of billions of dollars in advertising, it will be necessary to build a very solid measurement infrastructure and establish relationships with advertising agencies that it does not have now. It remains to be seen if the same promises that feed your ecosystem of products also allow them to build an advertising ecosystem as large as Google, Meta or Amazon have demonstrated in recent years. Cover image | OpenAI In Xataka | “The assemblies are not going to be done by AI”: we talk to the kids who have become carpenters, truck drivers and tinkerers

In 1987 a death was filmed so savage that people had to cover themselves. The trick to achieve it turned RoboCop into a cult work

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In 1987, the film director Paul Verhoeven gave a twist to action science fiction with RoboCop. In reality, that was a cocktail very much to the director’s liking where there was satire, cyberpunk and police thriller. The difference was that he did not limit himself to telling the fall and rebirth of a hero: he decided to win over the viewer with emotional hammer blows, with a death. so cruel and excessive that it was impossible to look at without feeling uncomfortable. The scene that changed everything. Alex Murphy, the protagonist, appears up to that point as a good cop thrown into a corrupt world, but the film doesn’t have time to build him up calmly, so it does it by the most brutal way: literally, it tear apart in front of the viewer so that, when he returns converted into a machine, he understands that what has been lost is not only flesh, but humanity. Verhoeven explained it with an almost religious and at the same time tremendously cynical idea: “if you want to resurrect Murphy as an all-powerful RoboCop, first you have to crucify him.” And that crucifixion, instead of being symbolic or elegant, is filmed like a physical nightmaredirty and painful, one designed so that the viewer cannot avoid the impact. The slaughter as a narrative. The sequence It is constructed like a public execution, with the criminals laughing in the background, and that is possibly the key to its violence: it is not just that it unlockis that along the way they humiliate him, turn him into a broken toy, and torture him as if the gang were enjoying the show. The scene is escalating until it seems impossiblewith the protagonist trying to understand what is happening to him while his body stops obeying him, and the band acting like real madmen. There is the moral trick of the director of RoboCop: The villains were absolutely grotesque, yes, but the film removes any sympathetic veneer from them and turns them into a total social menace. Thus, when the final shot arrives that puts an end to the execution, the viewer is no longer watching the typical “80s action” film, he is seeing the point of no return that makes the entire film, from that minute on, a story. of loss and revenge. The old school of effects. It is impossible to talk about this classic without mentioning what makes it unique. The how was filmed: no less than under the orders of the legendary Rob Bottin with an artisanal obsession that today seems unthinkable based on meticulously designed prostheses, molds, fake parts and physical tricks. In order for the mutilation to work without putting the actor at risk, a a fake hand From a real mold, it was reconstructed in fiberglass and divided into sections so that it could be “popped” with compressed air and stage blood without the need for explosives near the face. It wasn’t just an effect, it was a device home engineering: internal blood tubes, pressure control, parts that could be assembled and disassembled, and a repeatable explosion pattern to always nail the same result. “Death” was also filmed with a staging designed to hide the real and sell the fakewith raised floors, holes through which to put the real arm under the stage, and a member of the team moving from below a false arm attached with Velcro as if it were a living limb. The underground trick. Plus: Murphy’s death is supported by a secret choreography that the viewer never saw: operators out of shot, hidden mechanisms and an absurd number of hands working to make a second of screen seem like an organic nightmare. Not only that: a foam arm in disguise with a police uniform, a metal structure to hold it, hinges at the “elbow” and even a support anchored to the false floor so that everything could resist the violence of the effect. While the actor was dying and staggering above, below there was a team of professionals pumping blood by hand and adjusting compressed air. Even the shots that “break up” the armor were reinforced with simple but brilliant physical details, such as small charges of talcum powder to simulate fragmentation, a very cheap solution that, in camera, added texture and turned the scene into something tactile, with dust, impacts and material that seems to fall off the body. The Peter Weller doll. Another stroke of genius came with the moment of the auction: for a final shot that in the released version lasts a sigh, a Murphy’s full torsoa sophisticated doll with a latex face made from a mold of the actor, an internal fiberglass skull and mechanisms to move the neck, jaw and body. It was not a static mannequin, it was a creature manipulated by cablescapable of opening his mouth in a silent scream, leaning, trembling and reacting to the shot as if there was still life inside. The execution was designed so that the back of the head “jumped out” with a controlled explosionwith pieces pre-cut to break in a specific way and with the interior prepared with blood and soft fragments, so that the horror felt mechanical but compelling. In addition, the “sweat” detail was added with water sprayas if the doll was breathing for the last time, and a motor with vibration so that the body seems to tremble with fear, an almost obscene trick due to its human nature that returns to artifice. Censorship as an enemy. The most incredible thing is that, even so, what was seen in the rooms was a cropped version. RoboCop’s violence clashed head-on with the rating system of the time, and the film was given an X rating several times, forcing reedit, cut and sacrifice material until a commercially viable qualification is achieved. Paradoxically, the cut that helped save it was one that its own creators considered “shabby” or too obvious, the moment in which Murphy’s arm flies off pulled by a … Read more

AI saves you eight hours of work a week. As long as you’re the boss and you don’t have to use it yourself

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The AI ​​that was going to change everything and revolutionize our work He doesn’t seem to be doing any of that at the moment. What there is is a great polarization between those who believe in that promise and between those They do not see it at all clearly or they fear it. And if there is a place where this love-hate for AI is palpable, it is in companies, where CEOs see things in one way and employees in a quite different way. what has happened. The consulting company Section has conducted a survey of 5,000 workers and managers in US companies with a fundamental question: How many hours of work per week is AI saving you? Survey results, displayed in The Wall Street Journalsay a lot about the vision of CEOs and employees about the impact of AI tools. Source: WSJ. CEOs love her, employees not too much. According to data from that survey, two out of three employees indicated that AI does not save them time at work or that at most it saves them less than two hours a week. These responses contrast with those of managers and CEOs: one third affirm that it saves them between 4 and 8 hours, another third affirms that it saves them 8 or more hours, and the other third affirms that it saves them 4 hours or less. The big difference is precisely in this negative view: 40% of employees say that they do not save any time, and only 2% of CEOs agree with that opinion. AI screws up more than anything else, some say. A user interface designer named Steve McGarvey indicated in that text how managers “automatically assume that AI is going to be the savior (of the business).” His experience is different, however, and he tells how “I have lost count of the times I have looked for a solution to a problem, asked an LLM, and they gave me a solution to an accessibility problem that was completely wrong.” And it’s not that big of a deal. This professional also indicates that he uses Perplexity as an assistant to research on various projects and that it has saved him time. However, part of their job is to ensure that visually impaired users can access websites, and chatbots have not been of help in that task. The employees are somewhat afraid. There’s another important aspect to the findings: Employees were much more likely to report feeling anxious or overwhelmed by AI than excited by it. That 40% who responded that it did not save them time added that because of them they would never use AI again. Employees are the ones who are most overwhelmed by AI, managers are the ones who are most excited about it. Source: WSJ. For now AI is used like Google. But there is another problem and that is that many of these professionals are using AI as an alternative to the traditional search engine from Google. They do not use it for practical applications of their work—perhaps because they do not know how—and, for example, it was used much less for topics such as code generation or data analysis. It saves me time, but like it doesn’t. Software companies like Workday participated in the survey and pointed out an interesting fact: this technology imposes an “AI tax” in terms of productivity. Although 85% of its 1,600 employees surveyed indicated that they save between one and seven hours a week thanks to AI, that doesn’t help them much: Much of that saved time ends up being used to correct errors made by AI or modify content generated by AI. AI isn’t much use (yet). An additional and also recent survey conducted by PricewaterhouseCoopers focused on 4,500 CEOs. The result: only 30% of them were confident that there would be an increase in revenue thanks to AI, although they admit that having a good AI foundation can help boost that return on investment. The adoption of AI, however, at the moment is not compensating them too much, and only 12% of companies claim to have obtained benefits in revenue or costs, while 56% claim to have “not obtained anything” with that investment. These data are in line with those of the MIT study of August 2025 according to which 95% of pilot projects with generative AI were not paying off to companies. But. The data is negative, but there may be factors that point to a change in trend. The surveys do not indicate how much time users are spending learning how to use AI versus the time it saves them. The benefit may be negative now, but in the long term it will be positive. Furthermore, there are sectors in which AI has clearly become a clear tool to assist workers, as in the field of programming. Although there is, of course, a necessary phase of code review that AI generates, the massive use of these tools indicates that productivity may have gained in whole. Image | Redd F In Xataka | “We will lose social permission”: the CEO of Microsoft knows that either they do something valuable with AI or it will have little progress

Productivity had become an obsession. Until leisure has started to give better results at work

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The constant pressure to perform to the maximum has marked work life for a long time, leaving rest almost forgotten. A recent study shows how reserving well-planned leisure time changes the perception of daily routines and contributes to improved performance at work. Experts have verified that organize free time actively through crafts or other forms of abstraction brings improvements to creativity and motivation in your work tasks. This finding questions the belief that only by working non-stop can we achieve good work results. Let the brain create things. A group of researchers from the University of East Anglia in the United Kingdom and Erasmus University Rotterdam in the Netherlands investigated on the effects of creative craft-based entertainment during employees’ leisure time. The result of the experiment was not an improvement in the morale and motivation of the employees who participated in the study, but rather it contributed to these employees offering a more creative response in solving the problems that arose at work. Improvements in daily work life. The workers who participated in the study felt that, by exercising new manual skills, they better appreciated the processes of their crafts, making them gain value. The curious thing is that the change was bigger in the workplace than in his personal life, even though it was his leisure time. “We were surprised to see that crafts had a greater impact at work than in personal life. We expected similar benefits in both areas,” explains Professor George Michaelides, from UEA Norwich Business School. Curiously, the group that noticed this improvement the most was the one formed by the most senior employeesthose over 61 years of age. The explanation for this phenomenon is found in cognitive aptitude, a brain condition that is activated during learning processes. Gymnastics for the brain. Just as they collect the studies of Professors Gilkey and Kilts, of the schools of medicine and business at Emory University, carry out various creative activities that require a motor and cognitive combinationlike playing the guitar, juggling or learning a new language, helps expand the neural system and makes it more communicative. That is, the development of new skills through crafts was improving the “physical fitness” of the employees’ cognitive system, and the results were more visible in those more prone to cognitive decline and memory deterioration due to age. Keep “fit“Cognitive aptitude improves performance in decision making and problem solving, as well as in the generation of new ideas. The capacity for abstraction. One of the keys to the use of crafts or pleasurable leisure activities is that they act as a natural stress reducer and depressive symptoms. “Hobbies are already known to be good for well-being. But our study shows that hobbies not only make you happier, they can also help you feel more fulfilled and creative at work. This goes beyond simply relaxing or having fun (like watching Netflix non-stop) and turns hobbies into something that helps people grow,” says Dr. Paraskevas Petrou, the lead author of the study. Beyond the cognitive improvement derived from the development of the neural system, a study from Cardiff University found that the use of crafts or repetitive activities, how to knitinduces the brain into a state of full attention that increases abstract thinking activity by up to 25%, which contributes to the generation of new ideas and improves problem solving. In Xataka | Feeling overwhelmed at work is normal, but it is not ideal: six techniques to avoid it and be much more productive Image | Unsplash (Elena Mozhvilo)

How does this number of questions about housing work and what is it for?

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Let’s tell you What is telephone 047 and how does it work?. This is a toll-free government telephone number to make inquiries related to housing, and it comes into force from February 2026. With this number, the Government tries to offer citizens a reliable and truthful way to resolve any doubts they may have about housing, but also advice regarding possible conflicts. Let’s explain everything to you. How telephone 047 works The telephone number 047 is intended to access accurate information related to housing. Come on, if you have any questions related to legal or technical aspects of the home, you can call and ask about your rights and obligations. In this number you can make inquiries about topics such as rentals, sales or problems of coexistence with neighbors. You may also ask about urban leases, horizontal property, eviction procedures, prevention mechanisms, social housing and situations of vulnerability or legal protection of tenants. This phone also offers legal advice and support against market abuses. If you believe that your rights are being violated, you can call for help. For this legal part, the Ministry has the collaboration of the General Council of Lawyers of Spain (CGAE), which brings together 83 professional associations promoting arbitration and mediation methods. The idea is that mediation can be done to avoid going to court unnecessarily when there are conflicts. There are three levels when answering calls. The first level of attention is for basic consultations on the first call, those that are about general issues regarding rights and obligations regarding rental, property and cohabitation. It is expected that the first level can resolve between 90 and 95% of calls. There will also be a level for more specific and less general questions, such as those about specific cases or specialized areas. And there will also be a level to help with legal support or legal advice related to conflicts regarding housing. This advice and advice will be extrajudicial, meaning it will not be helped if the conflict is already judicialized. This number will be available to all Spanish users, regardless of the telecommunications company we have contracted. We will simply have to dial 047 without any type of prefix or anything else, and you will be put in contact with the helpline. Initially this service will have 25 people of different profiles and levelswho are the ones who will answer the calls. Among them there will be lawyers and personnel with specific training in housing matters.

What are they and how do they work when verifying that the message you receive is from who it says it is?

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Let’s explain to you What are verified SMS and how do they work?a technology that verifies that whoever sends you a message is who they say they are. This is something that has been around for a few years now, but we are going to see it more and more to fight fraud and scams. Let’s start by explaining to you in a simple way first the concept of these messages, so that you understand why it is important that they be normalized and used more and more. Then, we will also tell you in an understandable way how they work. What are verified SMS and what are they for? One of the most popular online frauds and scams out there is smishingwhich is a type of phishing in which a cybercriminal sends fraudulent SMS messages in bulk posing as a company. In these messages, attach a link or false information with which to start a process to steal your data, your online service accounts and even money. This has caused trust in the SMS we receive from companies to erode. In fact, when we receive communication through this method, the recommended thing today is not to trust it. And of course, this makes this type of notice no longer meaningful. And this is where verified SMS come into play, although they are not really SMS but rather messages that use the RCS protocol. In them, companies and entities can show an indicator that indicates them as an official channel or account. In Spain, BBVA or Bankinter has been one of the first large banks to start using this method. This way, when you receive a text message on your mobile, you will be able to distinguish when it was actually sent by an entity that has verified its identity and when it is an unidentified one. Thus, if your bank has its account verified when it sends you messages and you receive an unverified one, you will know that there is something strange, even if the name is the same. How verified messages work Verified messages are sent using RCS protocol. RCS are a type of messages that are sent like SMS and reach you in the same place as regular SMS, but with advanced functions such as sending photos, audio, creating groups, etc. It is a alternative to WhatsApp integrated directly into your messages application, both on Android and iPhone. In Spain, it is already a protocol that works with almost all operators. Regarding the company verification processaccording to the standard defined by the GSMA Entities have to complete a process before sending messages that appear as verified. First, the entity must register its identity with name and logo, and submit them to an external certification by a third party that validates that the entity can use that name and logo. This verification company must be included in the trusted list of the recipient’s operator. Those who verify the identity of the entities that want to send these messages are those known as Verification Authorities. These can be mobile operators, private companies specialized in digital verification or even government entities. The verification authorities They depend on each country and its deployment of this technology. Therefore, let’s take the case of Bankinter, which has been verified by Movistar. When this bank sends you a text message, it will do so with the RCS protocol. And since your operator recognizes Movistar as a valid verification authority, and Movistar has verified that the message comes from Bankinter, the message that you receive from the bank will have the verification badge. But there is one last step that your messaging application takes. Because when you receive the message, your app automatically downloads the sender’s profile and runs a series of technical checks before displaying the verification badge. It will even check if the verification signature is still valid with new messages. So, a complex verification chain is generated with several steps, and only when all of them are completed will the message appear as from a verified sender. This way, even if a cybercriminal manages to breach the security of one of the steps, there are still others. These are all protocols for sending verified messages within the RCS standard. In Xataka Basics | RCS vs WhatsApp, Telegram and other apps: advantages, disadvantages and why you no longer need messaging apps

We will increasingly see more “verified” SMS against fraud. The important thing is to understand how they really work

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We live watching our cell phones and what appears on their screen, from a notice from the bank to a code to authorize a payment. This dependency has turned the text message into fertile ground for deception, with campaigns of smishing that imitate well-known companies and sneak into conversations that seem legitimate. The problem is not only technical, it is trust: distinguishing at a glance who is really on the other side. For years, SMS has treated legitimate and fraudulent messages equally, and that neutrality is exactly what attackers exploit. Malicious campaigns detected in Spain show how names and formats of known entities are copied to gain the trust of the recipient. These messages are designed not to raise suspicion. And often, when doubt arises, it is too late to react. Say ‘hello’ to verified messages. Faced with the erosion of trust in traditional SMS, the industry has chosen to reinforce the identity of the sender instead of placing all responsibility on the user. Verified messages introduce a relevant change: they make visible whether a company has been recognized as legitimate before the message reaches the mobile. Supported by the RCS protocolthese messages add a name, logo and verification indicators with the intention of reducing one of the main weapons of fraud, confusion about the real origin of the message. BBVA. This is how it looks on mobile. In Spain, BBVA has been one of the first large banks to show this change visibly for the user. On Android, the bank’s official messages are identified with its name and logo, accompanied by an indicator that indicates them as an official channel. By clicking on that logo, the user can verify that the associated data, such as the telephone number or website, match those of the bank. Furthermore, these communications arrive in a different thread than traditional SMS, precisely to prevent them from being mixed with fraudulent messages. Bankinter has also taken the leap. Bankinter has partnered with Telefónica to distribute verified messages. The entity explains This will improve the security of “critical communications”, such as single-use codes for transfers or online payments. Here we will also find the sender verification confirmation, the official logo and additional information such as the website and a telephone number. How verification works. Behind that visible badge there is a process much less obvious to the user. The standard defined by the GSMA establishes several preliminary stages before a company can send a single verified message. First, the entity must register its identity, with a specific name and logo, and submit it to external certification by a third party that validates that the entity can use that name and logo. This validation is not enough on its own: the authority that issues it must be included in the trusted list of the recipient’s operator. Without that complete string, the check simply doesn’t show. Who verifies who. Here the so-called Verification Authorities come into play as third parties in charge of validating that a company is who it says it is before it can send verified messages. That role may fall to private companies specialized in digital verification, mobile operators or even government entities, depending on the deployment and the country. Afterwards, it is the user’s operator who decides whether they trust that authority, something that is sometimes reflected visibly in the message itself, as occurs in an official Bankinter example, where the system indicates that the verification has been carried out by Movistar. The final verification occurs when the message reaches the phone. According to the GSMA standard, the messaging app automatically downloads the sender’s profile and runs a series of technical checks before displaying any badge. It is checked that the signature is still valid, that the authority that issued it is accepted by the user’s operator and that the data has not been altered. Only if everything fits does the verification indicator appear; If something fails, the message loses that appearance of legitimacy. Does it work on iOS and Android? This scheme is not exclusive to Android. Apple added support for RCS as a carrier service starting with iOS 18, allowing you to send and receive messages with advanced features when not using iMessage. In practice, the behavior is the same: if the operator supports RCS and the standard is implemented, the system can display the name, logo and indicators associated with the sender. Without this support from the operator, the message returns to the familiar terrain of SMS or MMS, without additional verification signals. For the user, the practical learning is simple: a verified message offers more context and more clues than a conventional SMS, but it does not eliminate the need to remain cautious. Knowing that there is a technical process behind that distinction helps us better interpret what reaches our mobile phones and be wary when something does not match. However, in an environment where malicious actors never sleep, caution remains essential. Images | Vitaly Gariev | BBVA | Bankinter | Gemini 3 Pro In Xataka | Cybersecurity experts by day, cybercriminals by night: how two professionals fell after using ransomware

Uber Eats abandons autonomous riders after the fight with Work

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Uber Eats had been moving for some time within the perimeter of a rule that the Government promoted to redefine the labor market fit for home delivery in Spain. That standard, known as ‘Rider Law‘, put the focus on a crack that had been at the center of the debate for years, the figure of the “false self-employed“, and has been pushing the sector towards employee models or towards schemes in which the employment relationship is channeled through third parties. In this context, the fact that the platform now announces its intention to stop working with self-employed delivery drivers is not only an operational adjustment, it is a movement that contributes to reordering one of the great debates of the delivery. The announcement that finalizes the turn. Uber Eats has communicated that it will stop working with self-employed delivery drivers in Spain and links it to its adaptation to the current labor framework after several years of changes in its operations. The company explains that delivery drivers who still use the application as self-employed will be able to continue delivering as employees through collaborating fleets. “Uber Eats reaffirms its commitment to compliance with the Rider Law. After four years in which we have accumulated extensive experience working with expert logistics companies, and with the aim of promoting a long-term sustainable model, we have made the decision to stop collaborating with autonomous delivery drivers.” What happened on the way. To understand the scope of the movement you have to look back. Uber Eats does not reach this point from a fixed position, but after several changes of course from the approval of the ‘Rider Law’. In 2021, the platform stopped operating with freelancers and moved to a labor model based on subcontractors. One year later, in August 2022, opened the door to self-employment again and adopted a hybrid scheme in which salaried fleet delivery drivers and self-employed workers coexisted, in a context in which Glovo persisted in that model. On paper, the solution proposed by Uber Eats is clear. Delivery drivers who still use their application as freelancers will be able to continue delivering, but no longer as self-employed workers, but as employees of one of the collaborating fleets with which the platform operates. In practice, the transition from self-employed to salaried usually involves changes in the organization of work and conditions, although Uber Eats has not detailed how it will be applied in each case or deadlines for this transition. Not all delivery drivers could automatically fit into this traffic, nor is it clear how many real positions the fleets can absorb, which leaves open the possibility that some of these self-employed workers will be left out of the system. The threat of ‘the full weight of the law’. The background of this movement refers to a clash that came from behind. In October 2025, the Ministry of Labor raised the tone and waived the possibility of resorting to criminal proceedings if Uber Eats did not rectify its hiring model. The vice president and minister, Yolanda Díaz, was explicit in warning that “Uber (Eats) is not going to fool the Government of Spain, and I can already tell you that the weight of the law will fall on this company,” in reference to the use of false self-employed workers. A mirror in the sector. The Uber Eats movement does not occur in a vacuum. Glovo announced its change of model in Spain in December 2024 and operates fully with salaried delivery drivers from mid-2025while the criminal process continues against its top leader, accused of a crime against workers’ rights. Just Eat, for its part, stayed the course and persisted in its employee model. In this context, Uber Eats had remained the great exception, with a hybrid scheme that continued to combine fleets and freelancers. From now on, the focus shifts from the announcement to its actual landing. Uber Eats says it wants to put an end to pending litigation and facilitate a “fair process for everyone,” but it will be practical execution that will determine the extent of the turnaround. It remains to be seen how the transition from the self-employed to the fleets is articulated, how many delivery drivers manage to fit into that step and if the new scheme manages to dissipate the conflicts that have accompanied the sector in recent years. Images | Robert Anasch | appshunter.io In Xataka | The “absent recipient” trick: why delivery people mark your package as undelivered even if you were at home

Being over 55 years old does not only mean having work experience. Now it is also synonymous with being unemployed

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Labor market and demographics are two closely linked factors in which changes in one affect the other. Demographic aging is not only affecting the generational changebut is also generating an unprecedented change: for the first time in historical series, unemployment among those over 55 years of age exceeds that of the population between 25 and 54 years of age. Furthermore, the main difference is that reintegration into labor market for those over 55 years of age It does not occur in the same terms as in the younger segment of the population. This reversal of the historical pattern comes at the height of demographic aging, just when people are asking to work longer to support the pension system. A historic “sorpasso” in the senior unemployment. Historically, people aged 55 years or older registered less unemployment than the rest of younger workers, to the point that in 1994 their unemployment rate for this segment of the population was 9.2 points (11.7%) below that of the group of 25 to 54 years old (20.9%). This favorable gap has been progressively reduced until it disappears in 2023, at which point the differential became negative for senior workers. As stated in the study prepared by the BBVA and IVIE Foundation, in 2025, the “sorpasso” no longer leaves room for doubt and the average unemployment rate for those over 55 years of age reaches 9.8%, compared to the 9.4% unemployment rate registered for people between 25 and 54 years of age. This change occurs in a context of general improvement in employment in Spainwhich indicates a very notable relative worsening of the position of seniors within the labor market. That is, more is hired, but People over 55 years of age are not hired.. More time unemployed. As the BBVA Foundation report reveals, the problem is not only how many people over 55 years of age are unemployed, but also their duration of unemployment. it has been lengthening to the same extent that the gap with those under 55 years of age was reduced. “Their labor insertion is complicated, with longer periods of unemployment, fewer job opportunities and lower quality jobs,” the report points out. The data indicates that 57.9% of unemployed people aged 55 or over are long-term unemployed, having been unemployed for more than a year. looking for a job without finding it. This percentage contrasts with 36.1% among unemployed people aged 25 to 54 and 17.8% among young people aged 16 to 24. When they return they do so with worse conditions.. When these employees manage to re-engage in the labor market, they do so in much more fragile conditions than those they had. Among employees aged 55 or over with less than a year of seniority, that is, they have just joined a company, 52.6% have a temporary contract, 10% are in precarious employment with contracts of up to three months and 4.5% are permanently discontinued. On the other hand, among those employees over 55 years of age who have been in the same company for more than 25 years, temporary employment falls to 2%, there is hardly any precarious employment and discontinuous permanent employment is reduced to 2.4%. They return, but to worse jobs. According to the authors of the report, the differences are also noticeable in the type of occupations they enter after the period of unemployment. Among senior workers with more than 25 years of seniority who maintain their jobs, management, management or highly qualified occupations represent 45.6% of the total, while basic jobs only represent 7%. However, among older people who have just gotten a new job, only 15.6% occupy highly qualified positions and 29.4% end up in elementary occupations. This pattern is even worse than that of younger workers in the same situation: among those aged 25 to 54 who have just started a job, high-skilled occupations reach 29.1%, while basic occupations account for 20%. For the 16 to 24 year old group, these percentages are 27% and 15.5%, respectively. More dissatisfaction. Changing to a job with worse conditions also leads to an increase in job satisfaction for this segment of the active population, which, according to encrypts the studyrecords that 21.5% of newly employed seniors want to change their schedule and 16.4% continue looking for another job despite having found one, compared to 0.8% of their peers who have kept their job. In terms of salaries, the data paint a similar reality. The study by the BBVA and IVIE Foundation shows that the average annual salary of those over 55 years of age is 30,038 euros, above the 26,855 euros of the group between 25 and 54 years of age. But when the focus is placed on newly hired people over 55 years of age, their salary drops to 19,558 euros, slightly below the 19,837 euros earned by those aged 25 to 54 in the same situation and far from the 40,520 euros of senior workers who have not had their careers interrupted. In Xataka | 47% of the unemployed in Spain are over 50 years old. The problem is that many will not return to work until they retire. Image | Unsplash (guven karakoc)

that civil servants work less

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The reduction of working hours It was one of the most visible commitments of the Government for this legislature. Its objective was to reduce the working day from 40 to 37.5 hours per week without loss of pay. The proposal was processed, but ended running aground in Congress due to lack of support. Faced with this blockage, the Executive has chosen to advance where it does not need to negotiate with third parties or with Parliament. That is, on the only work area in which they have direct decision-making capacity: the officials of the General State Administration who do not depend on autonomous communities or city councils. The parliamentary failure of the 37.5-hour day. The general reduction in working hours required modifying the Workers Statute and, therefore, overcome a key vote in Congress. That support did not arrive, which left the measure without a legislative path in the short term. In this scenario, the Ministry of Labor formally maintains its commitment to reducing working hours, but cannot apply it to the entire labor market. This limitation explains the shift towards state public employment, where the Executive acts as a direct employer and can agree on the working conditions of state Administration officials, without having the support of the rest of the forces in the chamber. The 35-hour day and the reinforcement of teleworking. In this context, the core of agreement reached between the Ministry of Public Function and the unions involves implementing a 35-hour work week per week for employees of the General State Administration. The Government’s forecast is to approve it at the beginning of 2026 and for it to begin to be applied from February, once the organizational adjustments are finalized in each department. Along with the reduction in hours, the pact reinforces the Administration’s commitment to teleworking. It is not about introducing it from scratch, but about consolidating and organizing a modality that already exists, providing it with more stable regulations. The objective is to clarify conditions, guarantee technical means and prevent remote work from depending solely on internal decisions of each administrative unit. Both measures exclusively affect personnel dependent on the State. Excluding those public officials dependent on the autonomous communities, city councils and bodies with specific regimes, who maintain their own negotiating capacity. An important nuance: civil servants already worked less. The starting point for implementing this model of reducing working hours is not the same as in the private sector. The officials of the General Administration of the State had already established for years a working day of 37.5 hours per week, less than the ordinary legal of 40 hours. In fact, in public administrations dependent on communities such as Andalusia, Extremadura, the Basque Country, the Canary Islands, Asturias and Castilla-La Mancha and Castilla y León, already applied this 35-hour day since 2019, although some administrations they suspended them temporarily. This makes the measure announced now a continuing step that is already applied in other Administrations, thus equating state officials with regional officials. The other leg of the agreement: the pending salary increase. He agreement reached between the Ministry of Public Service and the majority unions is not limited to the working day. It also unlocks the application of the 2.5% salary increase corresponding to 2025, which had been pending payment, and 1.5% for 2026. This point is key to understanding the balance of the agreement since the reduction in working hours will not only imply a salary reduction, but is accompanied by a reinforcement of the purchasing power of officialsafter successive salary freezes and a context of inflation. Limited movement. Given that these changes only affect officials dependent on the State Administration, the real scope of the measure is limited in quantitative terms, since it affects approximately 250,000 public officials. However, it is a powerful incentive to attract the best talent to the Public Administration to address its rejuvenation process of the templates, and offering job stability and conciliation options. Factors that private companies increasingly limiting. In Xataka | The hoteliers cried out to the sky with the reduced working day. A hotel in the Balearic Islands has proven them wrong Image | Unsplash (Lissette Laverde)

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