Latvian unemployment ticks up a tad in first quarter

Take note – story published 5 years ago

Results of the Labour Force Survey conducted by the Central Statistical Bureau (CSB) show that in the 1st quarter of 2018 Latvian unemployment rate constituted 8.2 %. Compared to the previous quarter, unemployment rate rose by 0.1 percentage points, while compared to the corresponding quarter of the year before it decreased by 1.2 percentage points.

In the 1st quarter of 2018, 80.0 thousand persons aged 15–74 in Latvia were unemployed, which is 11.3 thousand fewer than a year ago and 0.3 thousand more than in the previous quarter.

Since the 3rd quarter of 2008, the Latvian unemployment rate has exceeded the European Union (EU) average (except for the 1st quarter of 2015 when both indicators were equal). In the 4th quarter of 2017, the Latvian unemployment rate (constituting 8.1 %) exceeded the EU average (7.3 %) by 0.8 percentage points.

In the 1st quarter, Latvia still had the highest unemployment rate in the Baltic states (6.8 % in Estonia and 7.2 % in Lithuania).

In the 1st quarter of 2018, the share of long-term unemployed persons, i.e., those who have been without work for 12 months or longer, in the total number of unemployed persons grew from 38.4 % in the 1st quarter of 2017 to 41.7 % in the 1st quarter of 2018. 

In contrast, during the 1st quarter of 2018, youth unemployment rate constituted 14.7 %, which is 2.6 percentage points lower than a year ago and 1.8 percentage points lower than in the 4th quarter of 2017. 

In the 1st quarter of 2018, 9.5 thousand or 11.8 % of all unemployed persons were young people aged 15–24.

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