OECD unemployment rate down to 6.5% in January 2016 | WPN World People News

The OECD unemployment rate fell by 0.1 percentage point to 6.5% in January 2016, 1.6 percentage points below the January 2013 peak. Across the OECD area, 39.9 million people were unemployed, 9 million less than in January 2013, but still 7.4 million more than in April 2008, before the crisis.

In January 2016, the euro area unemployment rate declined by 0.1 percentage point, to 10.3%, continuing its downward trend. Within the euro area, the largest falls were observed in the Slovak Republic (down 0.3 percentage point, to 10.3%), Ireland (down 0.2 percentage point, to 8.6%), Luxembourg (down 0.2 percentage point, to 5.8%) and Spain (down 0.2 percentage point, to 20.5%).

The unemployment rate in January 2016 also decreased by 0.1 percentage point in the United States (to 4.9%) and Japan (to 3.2%), while it increased by 0.1 percentage point in Canada, to 7.2%. More recent data show that in February 2016, the unemployment rate was stable in the United States.

In January 2016, the OECD unemployment rate for women was stable (at 6.6%), while the OECD unemployment rate for men declined by 0.1 percentage point (to 6.4%). While, in the pre-crisis period, the unemployment rate of women had exceeded that of men, both the crisis and the subsequent recovery disproportionally affected men. In the following period, between early 2011 and 2013, the unemployment rate for both groups remained stable at around 8%, with slightly higher rates for women; since then, the unemployment rates of both men and women have declined in tandem, with women’s unemployment remaining slightly above that of men.

Source: Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development