Eurozone and EU Unemployment Rates Remain Stable, but Youth Unemployment Persists

In the eurozone, which is made up of 20 member countries, the International Labor Organization (ILO) measured the unemployment rate at 6.4 percent in May. This was consistent with the previous month’s figures and down by 0.1 percentage points compared to the same time last year. Across the entire European Union (EU), the unemployment rate also remained stable at six percent in May, maintaining the same level as in April and May of the previous year.

There were an estimated 13.2 million unemployed individuals in the EU in May, with 11.08 million of them residing in the eurozone. Unemployment numbers increased slightly in May, rising by 38 thousand in the eurozone and 13 thousand in the EU on a monthly basis. Yearly comparisons showed an increase of three thousand in the eurozone and 163 thousand in the EU.

Spain and Greece were two countries within the EU that reported double-digit unemployment rates in May, at 11.7 and 10.6 percent respectively, while Sweden had one of the lowest unemployment rates at just 8.4 percent followed closely by Finland at 8.2 percent. The Czech Republic and Poland still held their positions as having some of the lowest unemployment rates in Europe with rates of just 2.7% and three percent respectively, other countries that had low unemployment rates included Malta and Slovenia with rates of just about three percent each while Germany and Netherlands had a rate of about three point six percent each .

For individuals under twenty-five years old, youth unemployment remained high across Europe but was slightly lower than last month’s figures for those living within Eurozone borders it decreased marginally to fourteen four percent while for EU residents it decreased to fourteen point two percent . Spain recorded one of