Number of unemployed jobseekers doubles in April

As of the end of April, a total of 433,100 unemployed jobseekers were registered with the Employment and Economic Development Offices in the country, showing a year-on-year increase of 203,400, said a government press release on Wednesday.

The number of unemployed jobseekers in April rose by 124,000 from the previous month.

The rapid increase in the number of unemployed jobseekers and particularly in the number of full-time lay-offs was due to restrictions caused by the coronavirus pandemic.

At the end of April, the number of people laid off in the whole country was 184,000, posting a year-on-year increase of 166,600. The number of people fully laid-off totalled 163,700, representing an increase of 152,100 from the corresponding number in April 2019. The number of long-term unemployed – that is, those who had been unemployed without interruption for more than a year – amounted to 67,400, registering an increase of 4,300 on the corresponding figure in the previous year.

The number of new vacancies reported to Employment and Economic Development Offices during April totalled 50,100, sliding by 18,700 from that in April of the previous year. In all, the number of unfilled vacancies at Employment and Economic Development Offices amounted to 113,300 in April, showing a year-on-year decline of 31,400. According to the Labour Force Survey issued by Statistics Finland, in April, the number of people in employment was 56,000 less than that in April 2019.

The rate of employment was 70.1 per cent, which was 1.1 percentage points lower than in April the year before.

According to the survey, the total number of unemployed people in the month was 217,000, or 2,000 less than a year ago. The unemployment rate was 8.1 per cent, or 0.1 percentage points higher than that in April of last year.