Book section: The crisis which started in 2008 looks like it is never going to end. Nearly nine years after the meltdown of the financial system and the violent recession followed by the euro crisis in 2012, recovery has been weak in the Euro Area. This elusive recovery has had dramatic consequences. In 2016, 16.2 million people in the Euro Area were unemployed. This is more than 2.5 million fewer than the high of 19 million in 2013, but it is still far from the 11.7 million unemployed in 2007 before the Great Recession kicked in. Moreover, 8.8 million people were long-term unemployed in 2015 and among them 5.7 million belong to the category “very long-term unemployed” (defined as 24 months or more of unemployment)