Life in Transition Survey 2016

The LiTS has become a critical data source for the EBRD. It allows us to understand how transition has affected the lives of people in the region, and how economic characteristics and experiences affect people's views on issues such as markets, the role of the state, trust, happiness, and prospects for the future. Since the first LiTS round in 2006, three Transition Reports - the EBRD's flagship publication - have been primarily or partly based on the LiTS. LiTS data are also used to support our project work on economic inclusion and the new “Investment Climate and Governance Initiative”.

The LiTS is also an important public good. It has been extensively used by the policy and research community in analyzing economic and social problems in the transition region. This encompasses a diverse range of topics including financial development, the impact of the 2008-09 crisis, institutions, corruption, public services, social inclusion, happiness, and social trust.

The LITS III aimed to achieve the following objectives:

• To provide feedback from households on the state of transition in client countries. This is a continued objective of the LiTS from the time of its inception to now and remains the driving objective behind the LiTS.
• To assess the relationships between life satisfaction and living standards, poverty and inequality, trust in state institutions, satisfaction with public services, and attitudes to a market economy and democracy throughout the region. Though similar to LiTS II in this objective, LiTS III took this a step further with the inclusion of a gendered asset module to identify inequalities in ownership within households and by asking further probing questions regarding perception of institutions.
• To formulate a better understanding of labour markets and entrepreneurship in the region. LiTS III features enhanced labour and entrepreneurship modules, which seek to build on the work of LiTS II as well as understand the type of jobs that people desire, the contractual arrangements employees have, what sectors people are working in, and what are the obstacles to enterprise success that people face. The LiTS III also contains a new unemployment module that strives to identify why people cannot find jobs, the avenues utilized to seek employment opportunities, and if and why job offers have been refused.
• To identify migration movements within the region. The LiTS III included more questions on migration, including past migration patterns of the family, the present location of emigrated family members, and the willingness/desire of people to move within the transition region and the EU for greater economic opportunities.
• To collect data that will make it possible to analyze average changes in the region over time. The design of the LiTS continues to allow the EBRD to track the average changes in the transition region over time.
• To stimulate systematic policy dialogue on the transition environment and to help shape the agenda for reform.

The LITS III is implemented in 32 transition economies: Albania, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Estonia, Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia, Georgia, Greece, Hungary, Kazakhstan, Kosovo, Kyrgyz Republic, Latvia, Lithuania, Moldova, Mongolia, Montenegro, Poland, Romania, Russia, Serbia, Slovak Republic, Slovenia, Tajikistan, Turkey, Ukraine and Uzbekistan, and in two comparator countries: Germany and Italy.