Unemployment rate as defined by the ILO falls in Q4 2019

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02/13/2020

Unemployment calculated according to the International Labor Office (ILO) model decreased in Switzerland in the 4th quarter of 2019, registering 3.9%, compared to 4.6% in the same period a year earlier. A total of 192,000 people were unemployed as defined by the ILO.

If unemployment of young people (15-24 years) rose to 7.7%, against 7.3% previously, said Thursday the Federal Office of Statistics (FSO). On the other hand, it decreased both among the 25 to 49 year olds, to 3.5% from 4.6%) and among the 50 to 64 year olds, to 3.4% from 3.9%.

All levels of education benefited from the fall in unemployment, both people without post-compulsory education (from 8.3% to 6.7%) and with secondary education (from 4.7% to 4.0 %) or tertiary education (3.2% to 3.0%).

Over the same period, the level of unemployment fell for people of Swiss nationality (from 3.5% to 3.0%) and for people of foreign nationality (from 7.5% to 6.3%).

In addition, the number of long-term unemployed within the meaning of the ILO (1 year or more) fell sharply from 93,000 to 67,000. The share of the long-term unemployed in the overall unemployed declined from 41.0% to 34.6%.

The number of people working part-time amounted to 1.762 million in the last quarter of 2019, an increase of 1.4% over one year. The share of part-time workers was 17.7% for men and 59.3% for women.

The European Union (EU) also saw its unemployment rate fall from 6.6% to 6.2% while the Eurozone benefited from a decline to 7.5%, against 7.9% a year earlier early between the last quarter of 2019 and that of 2018.

Increase in the active population

The employed labor force also increased over the period, increasing by 0.9% over one year to reach 5.13 million people. Women (+ 1.7%) largely contributed to this increase, while the number of men in active employment remained almost stable (+ 0.2%).

Between the last quarters of 2018 and 2019, the number of workers of foreign nationality increased by 1.7% and that of Swiss nationality by 0.5%. Cross-border commuters (+ 4.5%) benefited from this increase, partly due to a technical effect, as did holders of establishment permit C (+ 1.1%) and residence permit B (+0 , 7%). The number of employed workers holding a short-term residence permit L fell by 4.5%.

In terms of full-time equivalents (FTE), the increase between the last quarters of 2018 and 2019 was 0.6% (men: + 0.1%; women: + 1.4%).

ats, awp

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