Data just released by Eurostat shows unemployment in the EU at 10.9% for August, with the narrower Euro Area coming in at 12.0%. Both numbers are flat month over month and are a continuation of flattening in the increase of unemployment across the continent. However, year over year, the comparisons aren’t great with August 2012 rates at 10.6% and 11.5% respectively.
The nation-by-nation breakdown is still following the same trend among strength and weakness. Germany, Luxembourg, and Austria saw the lowest rates of unemployment with the usual suspects of Greece and Spain producing the highest. Year over year joblessness decreased in eleven countries, rose in sixteen, and remained the same for Poland. The biggest jumps came from Cyprus and Greece, while Estonia and Latvia saw the largest declines in unemployment.
In August 2013, 26.595 million men and women were unemployed in the EU28, of whom 19.178 million were in the euro area. Compared with July 2013, the number of persons unemployed remained nearly stable in both the EU28 and the euro area. Compared with August 2012, unemployment rose by 882,000 in the EU28 and by 895,000 in the euro area.
Youth unemployment remains a glaring, underlying problem for most of the continent as the strongest of nations in the area, Germany and Austria, have rates of 7.7% and 8.6% respectively. Faring far worse is Greece with a difficult-to-fathom 61.5% youth unemployment rate followed by an equally poor 56.0% in Spain.
In August 2013, 5.499 million young persons (under 25) were unemployed in the EU28, of whom 3.457 million were in the euro area. Compared with August 2012, youth unemployment decreased by 123,000 in the EU28 and by 52,000 in the euro area. In August 2013, the youth unemployment rate was 23.3% in the EU28 and 23.7% in the euro area, compared with 23.1% and 23.4% respectively in August 2012.
