Unemployment stable on low side

Malta’s unemployment rate in June remained unchanged when compared to the previous month and the island has kept its ranking at the lower end of the EU scale in terms of people seeking jobs.

New data issued by Eurostat yesterday shows Malta’s unemployment rate last June stood at 6.2 per cent, the same as registered in May and lower than the 6.9 per cent reached in June 2010.

Malta had the fifth lowest unemployment rate among the EU’s 27 member states and a much lower rate that the average in the eurozone, which in June stood at 9.9 per cent, unchanged from May.

The lowest unemployment rate in the EU in June was registered in Austria (four per cent), followed by the Netherlands (4.1 per cent). Spain, whose government has just announced early elections, topped the EU’s unemployment scale in June, reaching 21 per cent.

Significantly, Germany, considered to be the EU’s economic engine, has managed to slash its unemployment rate by a full one per cent in the last 12 months, indicating that the EU’s economy is back on a growth path.

Eurostat estimates that 22.4 million men and women in the EU27, of whom 15.6 million were in the euro area, were unemployed in June. Compared with May, the number of persons unemployed fell by 38,000 in the EU27 but increased by 18,000 in the euro area.

Compared with June 2010, unemployment fell by 706,000 in the EU27 and by 346,000 in the euro area.