Istat: unemployment drops to 8.9% in the third quarter

• Istat: + 35,000 employed in October, + 390,000 in one year.

  Rate at 58.6%

• In September, 500 thousand employed more than January.

  The unemployment rate drops to 9.2%

• Italy restarts: GDP estimates + 6.1% in 2021, but beware of inflation and unemployment

• Istat, second quarter unemployment rate falls to 9.8%.

  But 678,000 fewer employees since the pre-pandemic

• Eurostat, GDP and employment + 2.2% and + 0.7% in the second quarter

• Eurozone, unemployment still down: + 7.6% in July

Share

December 13, 2021 In the third quarter the unemployment rate drops to 8.9% (-1.3 points), in particular among young people between 15 and 24 years old it drops to 26.9%. This was announced by Istat. The period shows a marked decrease in the number of people looking for a job which falls to 2 million 256 thousand (-308 thousand in one year, -12%); this reduction mainly involves the former inactive with previous work experience and the short-term unemployed. On the other hand, people looking for work for at least 12 months have grown slightly (+22 thousand, + 1.7% in one year) and come to represent 58.6% of the unemployed (+7.9 points), for a total of 1 million 322 thousand people.

The number of inactive 15-64 year-olds continues to decrease also in the third quarter of 2021 (-453 thousand, -3.3% in one year), albeit to a lesser extent than in the previous quarter, settling at 13 million 287 thousand. Among these, 104 thousand (0.8% of the total inactive) are people on redundancy fund absent from work for more than three months, most of whom are not looking for work because they are waiting to return to their employment; this share decreased compared to 1.5% in the second quarter of 2021. The inactivity rate 15-64 years old dropped to 35% (-0.9 points), with a more intense decrease for women and young people.

On the job supply side, in the third quarter of 2021 there was an increase of 121 thousand employees (+ 0.5%) compared to the previous quarter, due to the growth of employees (+156 thousand, + 0.9%), due to open-ended and fixed-term contracts, which contrasts with the decline in self-employed workers (-35,000, -0.7% in three months); the number of unemployed fell (-134 thousand, -5.4%) and also that of inactive people aged 15-64 (-41 thousand, -0.3%). The provisional monthly data for October 2021 confirm the increasing trend of employed people (+35 thousand, + 0.2% compared to September), which is associated with that of the unemployed (+51 thousand, + 2.2%) and the decrease of inactive 15-64 years (-79 thousand, -0.6%). 

Compared to the third quarter of 2020, the increase in employment (+505 thousand units, + 2.2%) affects permanent employees (+228 thousand, + 1.5%) and, above all, those with temporary contracts (+ 357 thousand, + 13.1%); for the tenth consecutive quarter there was a decline in the number of independents (-80 thousand, -1.6%). The growth in employment involves both full-time and part-time employees (+ 1.9% and + 3.7%, respectively). There was a decrease in the number of unemployed (-308,000 in one year, -12.0%) and that of inactive people aged between 15 and 64 (-453,000, -3.3% in one year).

On the business side, in the third quarter of 2021 the signs of recovery in the demand for labor continued, with a cyclical increase in employee positions equal to 2.7%. Year-on-year, the 5% growth in employee positions marks a recovery of the overall losses incurred starting from the second quarter of 2020 when, following the pandemic, the demand for private sector jobs began to contract. Compared to the previous quarter, the positive signal characterizes both the full-time component (+ 2.4%) and, to a greater extent, the part-time component (+ 3.4%). The latter, most affected by the effects of the health emergency, shows a less marked increase on an annual basis than the full-time component (3.6% compared to 5.6%). Hours worked per employee increase by 3,3% compared to the previous quarter and 2.7% on a trend basis. The reduction in the use of layoffs continues, reaching 40.1 hours per thousand hours worked. The vacancy rate increases by 0.2 percentage points on a cyclical basis and by 0.9 on an annual basis.

The cost of labor per unit of work records a slight growth in economic terms, equal to 0.1%, due to the increase in wages, equal to 0.2%, and the decrease social security contributions of 0.2%. On an annual basis, the cost of labor increases more markedly (+ 1.1%), also in this case as a synthesis of a growth in the salary component (+ 1.7%) and a reduction in social security contributions (-0.6 %). Compared to the previous quarters, the decline in social security contributions is more contained also following the gradual fading of the effects of the reductions implemented starting from the second half of 2020 for the relaunch of economic activity.

In the third quarter of 2021 the employment rate was 58.4% (+0.4 percentage points on the previous quarter);

unemployment rate at 9.2% (-0.5 points) #istat https://t.co/MUFzmHV8yb pic.twitter.com/NWjb6I09Iw

- Istat (@istat_it) December 13, 2021