Harmonised Unemployment Rates (HURs), OECD - February 2014 | WPN World People News

The OECD unemployment rate fell by 0.1 percentage point for the third consecutive month to 7.6% in December 2013. Across the OECD area, 46.2 million persons were unemployed in December 2013, 11.5 million more than in July 2008.

In the Euro area, the unemployment rate was stable at 12.0% in December. The largest falls in the unemployment rate among countries in this area were observed in Spain (down 0.3 percentage point to 25.8%), Ireland (down 0.2 percentage point, to 12.1%) and the Slovak Republic (down 0.2 percentage point, to 13.8%). The unemployment rate also decreased in Italy (down 0.1 percentage point, to 12.7%), while it remained stable in France (at 10.8%) and Germany (at 5.1%).

Among other OECD countries, the unemployment rate fell in December by 0.3 percentage point in Japan (to 3.7%) and the United States (to 6.7%), while it increased in Canada (by 0.3 percentage point, to 7.2%), Israel (by 0.2 percentage point, to 5.8%) and Mexico (by 0.2 percentage point, to 4.8%). More recent data for January 2014 show that the unemployment rate decreased in the United States (by 0.1 percentage point, to 6.6%) and Canada (by 0.2 percentage point, to 7.0%).

In December 2013, the unemployment rate for men in the OECD area decreased by 0.2 percentage point (to 7.5%), while it was stable for women (at 7.8%).The unemployment rate for youth fell by 0.1 percentage point, to 15.5%, in December, 1.0 percentage point lower than one year ago. However, the youth unemployment rate remains very high in several Euro area countries, in particular in Greece (at 59.2% in October, the latest month available), Spain (at 54.3%), Italy (at 41.6%), Portugal (at 36.3%) and the Slovak Republic (at 32.6%).

OECD Harmonised Unemployment Rates, s.a.

Source: Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development