Prison does not deter European cannabis users
EUrologus compared how cannabis consumption patterns vary according to whether smoking in a given EU country is punishable by prison. Our data analysis article.
Saving culture from the pandemic
Eurostat data from 2019 show that in Europe, on average, 32 percent of workers employed in the Cultural and Creative Industry were self-employed. In some countries this percentage reaches almost 50%. The EU is pumping money into the CCI, but that won't be enough for a sector that structurally hinges on precarious working relationships.
A cultural pandemic: How Covid-19 hit Europe’s creative sector
Due to COVID-19, the economic losses of the European Cultural and Creative Industry (CCI) businesses will add up to billions of Euros. The EU stepped in with a top-up of its flagship Creative Europe programme. But pumping more money into the system won’t do. In many EU countries, the crisis has highlighted structural inequalities within the sector. And workers have started to mobilise.
Small EU countries had more COVID-related deaths per million since pandemic started
While the EU’s most populous countries are recording the most overall COVID-19-related deaths since the start of the pandemic, the Czech Republic, Hungary, and Bulgaria had the highest number of COVID-19-related deaths in relation to their populations during the same period.
How to dig the wealth of information stored by Wikidata and use it for journalism: a new R package
Our new R package 'tidywikidatar' makes it easier for data journalists to take advantage of the information available on Wikidata. This walkthrough exemplifies the main functionalities of the package.
EU has world’s safest roads, recorded fewest traffic-related deaths in 2020
In 2020, 4,000 fewer people died in the EU as a result of road accidents compared to the year before, according to the European Commission, making the bloc the safest region compared to the rest of the world and the global average of road traffic deaths. EURACTIV France reports.
The slow, uneven wane of the institutional psychiatry model in Europe
In the European Union, thousands of people with serious mental disorders live isolated and secluded from society, without receiving all the care they need. At least 150 million euros of EU funds, intended to improve their situation, have been used for other purposes.
United Kingdom: foreign workers flee the country in large numbers
Due to Brexit and multiple lockdowns, hundreds of thousands of expats have left Britain in 2020.
Italy faces even fewer infringement procedures
Since the beginning of the year, five infringement procedures have been initiated against Italy. Only five countries have kept their numbers lower. The total number of infringements against Italy has dropped to 82. This makes Italy the seventh least problematic EU country in this regard.
Why the Emissions Trading Scheme is not working, and how to fix it
Emissions are not for free in Europe. As a carbon trade system, the European Union’s Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS) sets an annual cap and a price for emissions. Wijnand Stoefs, policy officer at Carbon Market Watch, says it should become “a more ambitious tool”.
