The Eurozone (EA16) unemployment rate was 9.8% in October 2009, unchanged from September. It was 7.9% in October 2008. Unemployment has risen 3.1 million in the region in 12 months and the youth (under-25s) rate was 20.6%.
The EU27 unemployment rate was 9.3% in October 2009, compared with 9.2% in September. It was 7.3% in October 2008.
Eurostat, the statistics office of the European Union, estimates that 22.5 million men and women in the EU27, of whom 15.6 million were in the Eurozone, were unemployed in October 2009. Compared with September, the number of persons unemployed increased by 258, 000 in the EU27 and by 134,000 in the Eurozone. Compared with October 2008, unemployment went up by 5.0 million in the EU27 and by 3.1 million in the Eurozone.
The lowest unemployment rates were recorded in the Netherlands (3.7%) and Austria (4.7%), and the highest rates in Latvia (20.9%) and Spain (19.3%).
Ireland's unemployment rate was (12.8%) in October, compared with (7.2%) in October 2008.
Compared with a year ago, all member states recorded an increase in their unemployment rate. The smallest increases were observed in Germany (7.1% to 7.5%), Austria (4.0% to 4.7%) and Romania (5.7% to 6.4% between the second quarters of 2008 and 2009). The highest increases were registered in Latvia (9.1% to 20.9%) and Lithuania (4.8% to 13.8% between the second quarters of 2008 and 2009).
Between October 2008 and October 2009, the unemployment rate for males rose from 7.3% to 9.7% in the Eurozone and from 7.0% to 9.5% in the EU27. The female unemployment rate increased from 8.5% to 10.0% in the Eurozone and from 7.6% to 9.2% in the EU27.
In October 2009, the youth unemployment rate (under-25s) was 20.6% in the Eurozone and 20.7% in the EU27. In October 2008 it was 16.2% in both zones. The lowest rate was observed in the Netherlands (7.2%), and the highest rates in Spain (42.9%) and Latvia (33.6% in the third quarter of 2009).
Ireland's youth employment rate was 28.4%.
Last week, the German government approved a 12-month extension of the public subsidised part-time working scheme.
Known as 'Kurzarbeit' (short-time working), the scheme enables firms hit by the recession to get up to 67% of a worker's salary paid for a period of up to two years.
September data showed about one million workers were covered by the scheme.
The programme had been due to expire on December 31, 2009 and is now set to be extended by a year, although for firms applying next year will only get paid for a period of 18 months instead of 24 months.
In October 2009, the unemployment rate was 10.2% in the USA and 5.1% in Japan.
The Eurozone (EA16) consists of Belgium, Germany, Ireland, Greece, Spain, France, Italy, Cyprus, Luxembourg, Malta, the Netherlands, Austria, Portugal, Slovenia, Slovakia and Finland. The EU27 includes Belgium (BE), Bulgaria (BG), the Czech Republic (CZ), Denmark (DK), Germany (DE), Estonia (EE), Ireland (IE), Greece (EL), Spain (ES), France (FR), Italy (IT), Cyprus (CY), Latvia (LV), Lithuania (LT), Luxembourg (LU), Hungary (HU), Malta (MT), the Netherlands (NL), Austria (AT), Poland (PL), Portugal (PT), Romania (RO), Slovenia (SI), Slovakia (SK), Finland (FI), Sweden (SE) and the United Kingdom (UK).
