Number of unemployed jobseekers rises in Sep

A total of 315,800 unemployed jobseekers were registered at the Employment and Economic Development Offices at the end of September, an increase of 89,700 from the previous year, said a government press release on Tuesday.

The number of unemployed jobseekers, however, decreased by 13,900 from the previous month.

The number of unemployed jobseekers also includes those fully laid off. These figures are from the Employment Bulletin of the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Employment.

At the end of September, the number of people laid off was 73,600 in the whole country; a year-on-year increase of 60,000.

The number of people fully laid off totalled 56,700, representing an increase of 48,400 from September the year before. The number of people fully laid off decreased by 4,200 from August.

The number of long-term unemployed — that is those who had been unemployed without interruption for more than a year — amounted to 81,100, up 18,500 on the previous year.

The number of unemployed jobseekers aged over 50 was 113,500, representing an increase of 27,300 on the year before.

The number of new vacancies reported to Employment and Economic Development Offices during September totalled 58,100, or 7,400 fewer than in September the previous year.

In all, the number of unfilled vacancies at Employment and Economic Development Offices amounted to 103,000 in September; a decrease of 18,500 from the previous year.

According to the Labour Force Survey issued by Statistics Finland, in September the number of people in employment was 35,000 less than on the previous year. The employment rate was 72.0%, which was 0.7 percentage points lower than in September the year before.

According to the survey, the total number of unemployed people was 208,000, which is 47,000 more than that of a year ago. The unemployment rate was 7.6%, or 1.7 percentage points higher than the previous year.