Number of unemployed down by nearly 10,000 in past year
Text Mark Taylor
Photo Sebastian Herrmann / Unsplash
According to data from Statistics Estonia, the number of unemployed people in the first quarter of 2022 was 9,200 less than in the same period in 2021. The unemployment rate is now 5.5 per cent.
“There were 39,600 unemployed persons in the first quarter. That is 9,200 less than at the same time last year. However, compared to the last quarter of 2021, the number of the unemployed has risen by 3,300 persons,” explained Katriin Põlluäär, a leading analyst at Statistics Estonia.
There were 21,600 unemployed men and 18,000 unemployed women. More than half of them (55.6%) had been unemployed for less than six months. “The number of people who had been out of work for more than a year was 11,100, a few thousand less than a year ago,” Põlluäär added.
In the first quarter of 2022, there were 675,300 employed persons, which is 24,800 more than last year. Of the employed, 341,800 were men, and 333,500 were women. “The number of employed has increased for both men and women in the public and private sectors, and it is the highest recorded in recent years,” she concluded.
Of the employed persons, 86% worked full-time. The rest worked part-time. Two-thirds of part-time employees were women.
