He Minister of Finance, Mario Marcel, referred to the employment figures during the December 2023-February 2024 quarter provided by the National Institute of Statistics (INE).
The unemployment rate in the country was 8.5%, which meant an increase of 0.1 percentage points in twelve months. because the increase in the labor force (3.2%) was greater than that of employed people (3.1%).
In this regard, the head of the Treasury pointed out that This figure “is one tenth higher than what we had 12 months ago and is two tenths lower seasonally adjusted than what we had in the previous moving quarter.”
“This is the third rolling quarter in which we have seen a drop in the seasonally adjusted unemployment rate compared to the previous rolling quarter,” he added.
Marcel indicated that “at the same time we have growth, an increase in seasonally adjusted employment compared to the previous moving quarter of 37,000 people, which is greater than the increases we have had in the two previous moving quarters. All this indicates that the situation in the labor market is gradually improving.”
“This is probably going to be the last moving quarter in which we have an increase in unemployment in 12 months,” he stated.
In that sense, he commented that “job creation is beginning to accelerate. It remains concentrated in salaried jobs, and at the same time participation rates are finally returning to pre-pandemic levels.”
“All this then is indicative that the labor market is also beginning to normalize after all the adjustments that have occurred in the economy and that we are probably going to see additional improvements in the coming months,” he added.
Regarding the increase in the unemployment rate, Marcel explained that it is “fundamentally because the labor force is increasing and has been doing so during all the last moving quarters at a rate of around 3%, in this case it was 3.1 %, a figure that is much higher than usual.”
“And it is higher because it indicates that there are people who had withdrawn from the workforce who are returning. If these people are returning, and the vast majority of them are finding employment, it means that the situation in the labor market is improving,” he remarked.
2024-03-28 21:52:46