Gökhan Ergöçün
13 October 2021•Update: 13 October 2021
ISTANBUL
Unemployment rate in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) fell for the fourth consecutive month, according to latest data released on Wednesday.
The rate dropped 0.1 percentage point to 6% month-on-month in August, the OECD said in a press release.
However, it remains 0.7 percentage point above the pre-pandemic rate as at February 2020, the statement added.
The number of unemployed people across the area fell by 1 million to 39.7 million, which is 4.3 million more than the pre-pandemic level.
On the eurozone side, the rate was 7.5% in August, down slightly from 7.6% in July.
“There were falls of 0.3 percentage point or more in Greece (to 13.2%, from 14.2% in July), Finland (to 7.2%, from 7.8%), Spain (to 14.0%, from 14.5%), Latvia (to 7.1%, from 7.5%) and Lithuania (to 7.2%, from 7.5%),” read the statement.
Outside the euro area, the largest decreases were in Colombia (to 12.7%, from 13.6%), Korea (to 2.8%, from 3.3%), Canada (to 7.1%, from 7.5%) and the US (to 5.2%, from 5.4%).
Other countries saw slight changes or none at all: Australia (down to 4.5%, from 4.6%), Japan (2.8%), Mexico (down to 4.1%, from 4.2%), Poland (at 3.4%) and Turkey (at 12.1%), the statement said.
More recent data showed the US’ unemployment rate declined further in September 2021 (by 0.4 percentage point, to 4.8%) and Canada (by 0.2 percentage point, to 6.9%).
Youth unemployment increased slightly to 12.5% from 12.4% a month ago.
“OECD area unemployment rates for both women and men declined slightly in August to 6.2% (from 6.3% in July) and 5.8% (from 5.9%), respectively,” the statement added.
