Swedish unemployment plunges to 8% in July

Sweden’s unemployment rate dropped significantly in July to eight per cent from 9.5 per cent the previous month, official data showed last Thursday.

Some 415,000 people were out of work last month, Statistics Sweden said, hailing that “the number of unemployed persons and the unemployment rate have in recent months showed a downward trend which continued this month”.

Last month’s unemployment figure meanwhile marked “no statistically significant change” from the same month a year ago, the statistics agency said.

Adjusted for seasonal factors, the data showed that 8.5 per cent of Sweden’s working-age population, or around 423,000 people, was out of work last month, which was stable from June.

In its latest forecasts published on August 20, Sweden’s centre-right government lowered its unemployment estimate to 8.5 per cent for all of 2010 and to eight per cent next year, with the anticipated increase in jobs spurred by larger-than-expected economic growth. The new forecasts of a 4.5 per cent-rise in Swedish gross domestic product this year and a four per cent-hike in 2011 were published just a month ahead of Sweden’s September 19 elections, with the ruling coalition hoping a strong economic recovery will help it win a second four-year term.

The country’s economy, which was hard-hit by the global financial crisis but which emerged from recession in the second quarter of 2009, is today considered one of the strongest in Europe.