The number of people who telecommute increased by about 3% between the first and second quarters, with about 908,900 workers now in this situation, the National Institute of Statistics (INE) revealed this Wednesday in its new survey of employment for the second quarter of 2023.
During this period, the unemployment rate fell to 6.1% of the active population, but the unemployed population increased significantly year-on-year (compared to the second quarter of 2022), with an increase of almost 9%. For example, there are now 324,500 unemployed in Portugal, says INE.
The employment volume increased by 1.6% (also in homologous terms) to nearly 5 million people.
According to INE, “the proportion of the population who telework, that is, who worked at home using information and communication technologies, was 18.3% (908.9 thousand people)”, representing an increase of more than 0, 4 percentage points (pp) compared to Q1 2023.
According to the calculations of Dinheiro Vivo, the nominal increase between the quarters therefore exceeds 3%. In the first three months of the year, 881.6 thousand people were teleworking.
But compared to a year ago, this group has decreased by about 5%: in the second quarter of 2022, 958.6 thousand employees worked remotely.
Still according to the new INE survey, Portugal will now have about 324,500 people officially unemployed (they were actively looking for a job and it was available, but they couldn’t find a place), a contingent that “decreased by 14.7% (minus 55 .8 thousand cases) compared to the previous quarter and increased by 8.6% (25.7 thousand more) compared to the same period last year”.
So “the unemployment rate was estimated at 6.1% [peso do número de desempregados no total da população ativa]a figure 1.1 pp lower than that of the 1st quarter of 2023, but 0.4 pp higher than that of the 2nd quarter of 2022”.
It should be recalled that since the start of the inflationary crisis early last year, with the outbreak of the war between Russia and Ukraine, the economy has experienced a first phase of major expansion, with many companies taking advantage of very high inflation to increase their turnover. and increase profit margins.
Today, that phase is over and the sharp rise in interest rates by the European Central Bank (ECB) has begun to damage activity, clearly restraining consumption and investment, which could lead to serious problems in the business market in the long run .
For the time being, INE shows that although unemployment is rising sharply compared to last year, employment is still holding up.
The working population now numbers 4.979 million people, which represents an increase of “1.1% (54.7 thousand more employees) compared to the previous quarter and 1.6% (77.6 thousand) compared to the quarter” .
Employment: more men, young people, in construction
According to INE, the year-on-year change in the working population (the aforementioned 77.6 thousand jobs created or 1.6% more) is mainly explained by the increases in the following aggregates: “men (48.5 thousand ; 2 .0 %); people aged 16 to 24 (49.4 thousand; 18.7%); who have completed at most the 3rd cycle of primary education (171.3 thousand; 10.7%); workers in industry, construction, energy and water sector (72.2 thousand; 6.1%)”.
In particular, INE highlights job creation “in construction activities (40.7 thousand; 13.3%), the increase of which accounted for 56.4% of the sector’s variation”.
The group of employees got 110.8 thousand people or 2.7% more year-on-year, the number of fixed-term contracts increased by 68.1 thousand or 12.2% and the number of full-time contracts increased by 59.8 thousand or 1 .3% compared to the second quarter of last year , says the institute.
Source: DN
