Malta registers fourth lowest unemployment rate in EU
Unemployment in Malta has continued to decrease in June waning to 6.5 per cent, the lowest in the past 12 months.
According to new EU statistics issued today in Brussels, Malta has one of the lowest unemployment rates in the EU and is only outdone by Austria (3.9 per cent), the Netherlands (4.4 per cent) and Luxembourg (5.3 per cent) among the 27 member states.
Eurostat said that in June Malta managed to further lower its unemployment rate by 0.2 per cent from 6.7 per cent in May and 7.2 per cent in June 2009.
Malta’s unemployment figures have decreased across the board.
Youth unemployment decreased to 13.1 from 13.9 per cent in May, while both male and female unemployment decreased to 6.5 per cent from 6.7 per cent, respectively.
In the EU while unemployment remained stable in the euro area, at a record high of 10 per cent, it increased in the past year from 9.5 per cent in June 2009.
Compared to a year ago, four EU member states recorded a fall in the unemployment rate, one remained stable and 22 showed an increase.
The largest falls were observed in Austria (5.1 to 3.9 per cent), Malta (7.2 to 6.5 per cent) and Germany (7.7 to 7 per cent). The highest increases were registered in Estonia (11 to 19.0 per cent) and Latvia (13.4 to 20 per cent).
Eurostat estimates that 23 million men and women in the EU27, including 15.7 million in the euro area, were unemployed in June 2010.
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jcamilleri
Jul 30th 2010, 22:38
Imma kif xi whud xejn ma joghgobhom?
Ccharles Massa
Jul 30th 2010, 19:55
Kemm ahna tajbin. Issa GONZIPN imissu inaqqas it taxxi bhal ma kien wieghed qabel l elezzjoni
R. Mallia
Jul 30th 2010, 18:51
@Kate Ellul the point is not good or bad policies. When you have a country were increasingly families are facing financial difficulties despite both spouses are working full-time, yet they still cannot afford installing an airconditioning unit for their home, they are grasping for air everytime a bill needs to be paid, or the car insurance is due coupled with rent or loan repayment for the very basic need of all: a home. It's not a good sign and reminds me very much of the situation in Greece before the crisis hit in big time. We have to face it, the cost of living in Malta is nowhere reflected in the wages and this means that the standard of living of the Maltese is always decreasing. Remember an economy is a chain, if the population has no purchasing power the wheel stops turning....
Anthony Pace Gouder
Jul 30th 2010, 15:18
It would be interesting to know which sectors of the Maltese Economy registered these new Job opportunities ! Some may be purely seasonal as in the Hotel and Catering sectors . Then how many of these new jobs are actually Full-time and Part-time .
R. Mallia
Jul 30th 2010, 15:07
Mhux bilfors jekk Malta hawn sitwazzjoni ta' cheap labour! Kif qatt tista' tqabbel mal-Lussemburgu meta hemm il-paga minima nazzjonali hija 1600 EUR? Kieku l-paga minima nazzjonali Malta titla' daqs dik tal-Lussemburgu tahsbu li se nibqghu r-raba fil-lista? Dawn kollha indikaturi foloz ghax qed isir paragun "like with like"!!
Kate Ellul
Jul 30th 2010, 16:24
False: Greece is in a disasterous economic situation and there salaries are comparable to ours and not to the Swedes'or luxembourgers. You have to accept reality, that is, we Maltese are capable of working hard and getting there, while GOnzi PN is giving us the fishing rod by which we are catching the fish, HSBC shares, BOV, our banks passing the stress test, aircraft maintnce industry, etc etc........All this cannot be the result of wrong policies.
PR. Borg
Jul 30th 2010, 14:21
Malta registers 4th lowest but Gozo i would suspect registers the highest unemplyment rate, you can add my name to the unemployment list, oh i also have 6 O'levels and 2 A's, so what do i do emigrate or what.
Maria D.sacco
Jul 30th 2010, 14:06
Caspita!!! Illum ma tistax tigi wahda hazina, milli jidher. L-ewwel id-deficit jonqos, imbaghad li rcevejna aktar flus mill-Unjoni Ewropeja ma' Finland, imbaghad din. Mhemmx x'taghmel, Nittamaw li l-qaghda tehzien ha jkollna fuqhiex neqirdu, ballec!!
Peter Korsten
Jul 30th 2010, 13:38
Whilst it's encouraging that unemployment is going down, it should also be noted that Malta has the lowest labour participation of the entire EU. This will show the unemployment figure in a much brighter light than it really is, because other countries might have a higher official unemployment rate, but still a higher percentage of the population working.
Gianninu Saliba
Jul 30th 2010, 15:10
All over Europe the wife must work so that the family makes end meet. In Malta the wife has the luxury of staying at home to look after the family whilst the husband might have to work overtime or have a part-time weekend job. Honestly your argument does not hold, so must we also add the children into the pot of labour participation - in China and many other countries in the East, the whole family has to work including 9 year old children. Surely you must have noticed that our government is trying its utmost to encourage women to work, but as we say in Maltese "ghandhom munqarhom fix-xghir" and we thank God for this.
Kate Ellul
Jul 30th 2010, 13:25
Kollu tort ta Gonzi. Il problema hi jekk JM jibqax 'unemployed' tlett snin ohra jew le.
r ferriggi
Jul 30th 2010, 13:19
this is good ,,,,,,, if not great news.
apart from the detractors, the doubtful,,, the mistrusting of these statistics,,,,,,
why doent the government experts THINK and PLAN and PREPARE course like the avoinics courses BUTSPECIALLY DIRECTED TOWARDS GREEN TECHNOLOGIES ??
it is obvious,,,,,,,,,,,, that this is going to be a DRIVING FORCE in industry.
jobs in the manufacture and R&D of green products.
electricity,heat, and power generation using green technologies.
an ALL OUT drive including incentives fo CLEAN AND GREEN TECHNOLOGY.
N.Calleja
Jul 30th 2010, 13:06
Very positive HSBC financial results, lower unemployment data, very positive MEA results, lower deficit. Four very convincing news items!! All this shows that the 'par idejn sodi' slogan is having its effects!! How many PL press releases are going to be sent? Any of these results to be mentioned on One TV new bulletin?? Any bets?
Michela Caruana
Jul 30th 2010, 13:05
Bi Prim Ministru li skond Joseph Muscat ma jifhimx fl-ekonomija dawn ir-rizultati mhux hziena!!
Gianninu Saliba
Jul 30th 2010, 12:59
Hello Joseph, what were you saying about unemployment in Malta? Don't worry, my friend, Malta is in safe hands. If your precious idol Dom could have lowered unemployment in the same fashion that he lowered our standard of living, unemployment might have been one or two percentage points higher that what it is today. Please, Joseph, do not come and tell me that Mintoff helped the poor and the lower class - the Nationalist Goverments that followed made sure that they created productive jobs and not Labour Corps, created prosperity and not charity and secured stability and not chaos.
E Gatt
Jul 30th 2010, 12:54
I'm sure the Labour doom and gloom brigade will find something negative to comment about this good news too.
Nice weekend.
JSciberras
Jul 30th 2010, 12:52
Unemployment benchmarks should always be assessed relative to the activity rates of different countries. Malta has one of the lowest activity rates of its working population. A small change in this rate is drastic for many failies with one bread-winner (over 60% of women are not active within the labour force).
Other countries with higher unemployment rates however, are still generally better off than Malta, due to higher activity rates. For example, a country with 80% activity rate and 10% unemployment would be considered a much better performing economy than Malta with a 6.5% unemployment rate in the context of its current acivity rate.
Figures should be interpreted with more caution.
Mark Giglio
Jul 30th 2010, 17:20
Well-said.
David Magro
Jul 30th 2010, 12:51
Let us see how long it's gonna take to see a negative comment about this one !?!?! Is this a bad thing or?