Low Skilled Work in Europe

[RichardY]

I was wondering if anyone has advice or ideas about finding low skilled relatively high remunerated work in Europe, with low probability of physically crippling injury or illness.

 

Location is not important in itself it could be the frozen reaches of Svalbard, although I would prefer somewhere warmer like Austria or Switzerland. Different languages are not too much of a problem, although French sounds to me like someone speaking with oil in their mouth, could just be the south though. Portuguese sounds like whispers. Germanic languages sound more distinctive to me, which is good and Spanish has a nice rhythm in my opinion.

 

Type of work

 

If meaningful, fun or with good colleagues happy atmosphere, then subsistence pay, Portuguese Green Soup, plus coffin sized living space and ability to save for an emergency fund and cover travel costs.

Meaningful, involving pursuing Justice, but not as a lawyer.

Fun, something creative maintaining trails through a forest, dry stone walling, building small dams.

Happy atmosphere, involving harvesting grapes or apples on a small farm, by the piece perhaps. Or working in a country pub or beer garden, something with a bit of life and music, with a variety of ages, not sterile like Norway or some high class city bar.

 

If loud, physically uncomfortable or especially repetitive work, high paid relative to skills and for 1 month or less.

 

Or work in an area with fewer work and living standard concerns, perhaps in a scenario where an area has an oil boom or gold rush and labour cost or goods margins can be more flexible. Maybe working as an Office Clerk, Shop Assistant, Waiter, Cleaner, Gardener or Merchant.

[rosencrantz]

I was wondering if anyone has advice or ideas about finding low skilled relatively high remunerated work in Europe, with low probability of physically crippling injury or illness.

 

At least here (Austria) you can create a company fairly easily and then get work as a contractor. But the competition from Eastern Europeans is pretty hard. In addition, most European countries have restrictions on visas.

[liberecak]

Have you considered teaching English as a foreign language?

[RichardY]

In Reply to: Rosencrantz

 

At least here (Austria) you can create a company fairly easily and then get work as a contractor. But the competition from Eastern Europeans is pretty hard. In addition, most European countries have restrictions on visas.

Yes competition is fairly hard near where I live in the UK,  Boston a local town is 50% Polish speaking, Spalding another local town probably around 40% by government figures, not sure about other nationalities like Lithuanian.

 

Is there a particular part of Austria where its easier to get work as a contractor (Basic Manual Labour, Painting or Tiling) is Vienna or Innsbruck good? I've been through Passau looked quite up market (might be 3rd World Dictators Stashing money there?) , Linz had a lot of Roma I think in the town. Salzburg seemed heaving, lots of Chinese (In May). Is there a particular season for touristy work where basic labour is in demand, perhaps in bars or skiing lodges?

[RichardY]

In Reply to: Liberecak

 

Have you considered teaching English as a foreign language?

 

I have, my concerns are not having a degree (£9000 per year UK, 3 years study) and qualifying for a skilled visa. With the anxiety of being easily expendable by national governments, salary is not too important, if I became competent in German, Spanish or Mandarin I'd consider that as part of my compensation.   

[rosencrantz]

Linz had a lot of Roma I think in the town.

 

I live there. I would not move there unless you have something figured out already. No idea about other regions, but Linz and Vienna are pretty tight right now.

[liberecak]

You don't actually need a degree to TEFL. It helps to have a CELTA certificate or something of that ilk, but you could just rock up in whatever town takes your fancy and go and knock on language school doors till you get a job. Language schools tend to be fairly chaotic places with high employee fluctuation.

 

I don't know what nationality you are, but if you are an EU citizen you don't need a visa. I've been TEFLing for nearly 18 years, albeit in the same place, so if you have any questions fire away.

[RichardY]

What sort of salary range is there for someone TEFLing in the Czech Republic, do many schools include a CELTA or TEFL certificate, perhaps paying for it if you stay a certain amount of time? Are the living expenses relatively high in the Czech Republic?

 

I'm English, home counties accent.

[liberecak]

You'll probably get put on a self-employment licence, thereby cutting the evil state out of the picture and making Stefan happy. You'll get paid 200-350 CZK per hour, depending on what school you are at and where you are. Prague used to be better paid, but I've heard it isn't now, because there are so many teacher already there. One hour is 45 minutes, obviously. You'll be expected to teach up to about 30 of these hours a week.You might get a CELTA at a school in Prague, but I expect you'll have to pay for it. It'll be cheaper than in the UK though. You might try your luck in a small town of up to 10,000 people, where you'll be the only Englishman in town and they might not care about such frivolities.

 

I believe there are internet courses you can take which are cheaper, but I can summarize what I learnt on my CELTA twenty years ago thus:

There are three stages to teaching, abbreviated to PPP.

Presentation: you explain stuff to your students. It's better to elicit than just tell them.

Practice: they fill in some gaps or choose whether option a, b or c fits best or something.

(Can't actually remember this one): free practice. For example, if you've just taught them past simple, ask them what they did at the weekend, or what they like and don't like eating if you're doing food, what their favourite restaurant is etc.

 

Nowadays they have more modern techniques I believe. You'll learn to shake it up how you like i time. Nonetheless, asking people how their weekend was takes up a reasonable proportion of my working week.

 

Living costs are low, and it's a good country for outdoors stuff like hiking, climbing and skiing.

[RichardY]

Thank you for the information liberecak, very helpful.