Paris (AFP)

As a consequence of the resumption of activity with deconfinement, the number of unemployed continued to fall in June in France, but it remains at a historically high level, justifying the "absolute priority" given by the government to employment in the face of an uncertain return to school.

After a first decline of 3.3% in May, the number of unemployed fell 4.6% in June, or 204,700 registered in category A (without activity).

But this decline is still far from erasing the exceptional increases due to confinement (+ 22% in March, + 7% in April), which means that the number of unemployed remains at the very high level of 4.221 million. Either over the quarter, from April to June, an unprecedented increase of 800,000 unemployed.

As in May, this drop in June is due to the return of job seekers, who no longer worked with confinement at all, to reduced activity.

As a result of the restart of construction sites and the reopening of establishments in the hotel and catering industry, the decline in June is "more particularly carried by the drop in the number of those looking for a profession in construction and construction, as well as in the hotel industry and tourism ", underlines Dares, the statistical service of the Ministry of Labor.

Stronger among men (-5.8%) than among women (-3.3%), the drop was also more marked in the tourist regions of the west coast (-6.9% in Brittany), PACA and Corsica (-7.5%).

For the moment, due in particular to the high use of short-time working in recent months, registrations for redundancies are still low (9,900 in June, almost stable).

But the announcements of social plans have multiplied in recent weeks: some 43,343 job cuts are being considered as part of the job protection plans (PSE) filed since March 1 against 16,514 over the same period last year.

© 2020 AFP