Unemployed jobseekers’ number grows over year, shrinks over month

A total of 248,100 unemployed jobseekers were registered with the employment and economic development offices across the country as on end-February, said the economic affairs and employment ministry in a press release on Tuesday.

The number is 2,300 more than in the corresponding point of time in 2019. The number, however, declined by 3,500 from that in the previous month.

The number of long-term unemployed, those who had been unemployed without interruption for at least a year, stood at 63,200, rising by 1,500 from the corresponding figure of 2019.

Among those aged over 50, the number of unemployed was 93,600, representing an increase of 700 year on year.

The number of unemployed jobseekers aged less than 25 totalled 29,800, posting a decrease of 700 from that in February last year.

For 64 per cent of the unemployed young people, the period of unemployment ended within three months on average between January and February, which is 0.9 percentage points more than in the year before.

According to the Labour Force Survey issued by Statistics Finland, in February the number of people in employment was 20,000 more than that in the previous year. The employment rate was 71.3 per cent, or 0.5 percentage points higher than in February 2019.

According to the survey findings, the total number of unemployed people in end-February stood at 187,000, posting a slide of 13,000 year on year. The rate of unemployment was 6.9 per cent or 0.5 percentage points less than the corresponding figure in the previous year.