In Seine-Saint-Denis, the health crisis has a strong impact on employment

Seine Saint-Denis is paying a heavy price for the social and health crisis. According to the latest report from the Ile de France Chamber of Commerce and Industry, “the Ile-de-France economy has barely caught its breath” in the third quarter of 2020, but the effects of the “shock” caused by the Covid have been devastating on the employment front. In the “93”, the unemployment rate has now reached 12%, breaking all regional (8, 8%) and national (9%) records. If the department has shown a decreasing curve for five years, we must go back in 2017 to find a comparable unemployment rate.

The Crocis (Regional Observation Center for Trade, Industry and Services), which conducted the study, points to an increase of 2.8% in the number of job seekers compared to the previous quarter. But he invites us to put things into perspective by specifying that this second quarter was atypical because “at the height of the health crisis, during the first confinement, the unemployment rate continued to fall”. In fact, to be considered unemployed within the meaning of the International Labor Office, one must be available immediately. “However, it was not possible from mid-March to mid-May”.

The comparison with the fourth quarter of 2019, that is to say before the crisis, is therefore more judicious. The increase in the number of job seekers between the two quarters then amounts to 1.5%. Despite everything, this remains higher than the average in Ile-de-France.

A paradoxical evolution of the unemployment rate

At the same time, the summer of 2020 was marked by encouraging signs of economic dynamism in Seine-Saint-Denis. Despite the rise in unemployment, employment was on an upward trend with an increase of 1.8% over one quarter, mainly in the construction and tertiary sectors “boosted by temporary employment, increasing by almost 20%. % ”, Specifies the CCI.

The good figures for the department are also found on the side of business creations, numbering 9,649 in the third quarter of 2020, a jump of 38.6% in one year. This favorable development, which has brought the cumulative number of business creations over the last twelve months to 32,260, can be put into perspective in a context where “part of the volume of creations is carried out by unemployed people who try, in some way. sort, to create their own job thanks to the microentrepreneur scheme, ”says the authors of the study.

We must also remain cautious about the number of business failures in Seine-Saint-Denis, which amounted to 275 units, a decrease of 33.4% compared to the previous year. “The public aid measures keep certain businesses afloat, which risk disappearing when these support measures cease,” concludes Crocis.

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