The unemployment rate and the number of unemployed people have already started to rise in several countries of the European Union (EU), according to Eurostat data released yesterday.
The unemployment rate worsened in November (compared to the same month in 2021) in eight countries and the number of unemployed increased in ten economies; Portugal appears in both groups, according to calculations by Dinheiro Vivo based on the new official data.
Between November 2021 and the same month of 2022, the average unemployment rate (which measures the share of the unemployed in relation to the active population) has been reduced by six tenths of a percentage in the EU and in the euro area. the rate was 6%. In the Eurozone by 6.5%. According to the estimate sent to Eurostat by the National Institute of Statistics (INE), the unemployment rate in Portugal is 6.4%.
The European unemployment rate is still declining with significant declines in countries such as Greece (minus 1.7 percentage points), Italy (minus 1.2 points), Spain and Sweden (both minus one percentage point in the rate) and Ireland (minus 0 .8 point).
But there are countries where the evolution is going in the opposite direction, where the weight of unemployment is increasing. This is the case for Estonia, Portugal, Hungary, Malta, the Czech Republic, Austria, Denmark and Cyprus. Portugal registered a two-tenths worsening of the unemployment rate (for the aforementioned 6.4% of the active population). The worst case is Cypriot, with 0.9 points more between November 2021 and the same month 2022.
In Portugal (as well as in most of the dozen countries of the EU) the movement of increasing unemployment is taking place as the contingent of unemployed people is growing faster than the active population.
In the Portuguese labor market, the trend for a slight increase in the second half of this year has been but sustained, bringing the number of unemployed to 332,000 last November, 3.4% more than a year earlier.
Nine other countries are following the deterioration of this unemployment indicator. In addition to Portugal, the cases of the Netherlands, Latvia, Estonia, Hungary, Austria, Malta, Cyprus, Denmark and the Czech Republic stand out.
In Denmark and the Czech Republic, the frontrunners, unemployment rose by about 20% in absolute terms, according to data published by Eurostat on Monday.
In Portugal, the problem will not only be unemployment. The most recent signals, calculated by INE, are also not favorable in terms of employment.
As recently reported by the DV, national employment almost stagnated in November, growing just 0.3% compared to the same month of 2021, the weakest reading since the pandemic’s peak mortality period (early 2021).
It would have been worse if it hadn’t been for the very young. Here, the employment of the over-25s started to fall (it fell by 0.6%, its worst record since January 2021), but the face of the labor market was finally saved by a record increase in the number of jobs. by very young individuals (15 to 24 years old).
The volume of employment in this age group of the youngest of them all increased by 16.8%, which is, so to speak, the highest figure in this long series of INE dating back to 1999.
Yet in the year ending November, only 16,000 new jobs were added to total national employment; there are more than 42,000 very young workers (under 25 years old); the group aged 25 or older lost nearly 26,000 jobs, according to official INE data, albeit preliminary (from November).
Source: DN
