Unemployment drops to 5.8% in Q3

According to the Labour Force Survey the unemployment rate dropped to 5.8% in the third quarter of 2010, compared with 6.4% in the second. However, it was still higher than in the same period of 2009, when a rate of 5.4% was recorded.
The Labour Force Survey is carried out in accordance with EU rules and counts all people looking for employment, not only those who are registered.
The total number of unemployed was reported as 23,590 (males 12,779 and females 10,812), compared with a registered unemployment of 20,671 at the end of September.
The unemployment rate was thus reported at 5.8% of the labour force (males 5.7% and females 5.9%).
The unemployment rate for young persons aged 15-24 was much higher, at 13.0% of the labour force of the same age group but recorded a decrease compared with both the previous quarter (18.6%) and the corresponding quarter of 2009 (15.8%).
While unemployment rose compared with the year earlier, so did total employment. The total number of employed in the third quarter of 2010 was 385,993 (males 212,385 and females 173,608), compared with 382,085 in the same period of 2009.
This is explained by the fact that the labour force expanded in the same period, by 5,544 people, to 409,584, from 404,040 in the third quarter of 2009.
The employment rate for people aged 20-64 was 75.7% (males 83.1% and females 68.3%)–the same level as the previous quarter and the corresponding quarter of 2009.

Fiona Mullen