Eurozone Unemployment Level Hits The 10% Mark

By: Mike Campbell

It is a well-known economic fact that unemployment lags behind recovery after an economic downturn. The reason for this is that businesses have to experience a rise in demand for their goods or services before they can afford to re-hire employees and take the decision to advertise posts.

So, with a relatively weak recovery underway, it is perhaps not surprising that the average level of unemployment within the Eurozone countries has surpassed the 10% mark for the first time in its history. Of course, there is a wide degree of variation of unemployment levels within the group of 16 nations which use the single European currency.

Almost one in five Spanish citizens (19% of the workforce) is currently out of work whereas in the Netherlands, the figure is one person in twenty-five (4% of the workforce); reflecting differences between the economies. These figures reveal that almost 15.8 million peoples are out of work within the Eurozone countries. If you include the rest of the EU nations, the average rate of unemployment dips to 9.6%.

The German state has issued its own unemployment statistics which show a slight reduction in unemployment this month from 8.1 to 8% - good news for the 31000 Germans that found employment this month.

Over the years, successive UK governments have perfected the art of “how to lie with statistics”. A splendid example of this was presented in the latest set of unemployment figures which proudly boast that unemployment has fallen by 33000 in the three months to January (standing at 7,8%), but at the same time, the number of people in work fell by 54000 to 28.9 million. Perhaps Her Majesty’s government can finally provide us with the definitive answer as to just how many angels can dance on the head of a pin.