The situation on the German labor market continues to deteriorate in view of the economic consequences of the Ukraine war.
As the Federal Employment Agency (BA) announced on Wednesday, the number of unemployed continued to fall in November: by 8,000 to 2.434 million.
However, the decline is weaker than usual for November.
And taking into account the usual seasonal fluctuations, the number of unemployed has actually increased – by 17,000.
Britta Beeger
Editor in business and responsible for "The Lounge".
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That was also the case in the previous two months.
In October, the Federal Employment Agency for the first time did not attribute this development to the fact that many refugee Ukrainian women were registering as unemployed.
Rather, it is about the consequences of the economic slowdown.
CEO Andrea Nahles said "a certain turnaround" is emerging.
In other words: the high inflation and the sharp rise in energy costs are leaving the first scratches on the labor market.
Number of people in employment at a record high
This can also be seen in the new figures for November from the fact that companies are again registering short-time work for more employees: between November 1st and 24th for 82,000 employees.
BA board member Daniel Terzenbach described the situation on Wednesday as "stable" and pointed out that employment was increasing significantly.
In fact, despite the recession expected for the coming months, the number of people in employment rose to a record high in October, as the Federal Statistical Office announced on Wednesday: to 45.7 million.
That was 113,000 or 0.2 percent more than in September.
The increase was thus slightly above the October average for the three pre-crisis years from 2017 to 2019. Seasonally adjusted employment also continued to rise in October, and somewhat more significantly than in the three previous months.
Employment subject to social security contributions also continued to increase according to the BA in September – more recent data are not yet available.