Unemployment rate drops in April
According to data released by Eurostat, labor market conditions in the common currency bloc improved in April. The number of unemployed people fell 53,000, and the unemployment rate notched down to 8.5% in April from a revised 8.6% in March (previously reported: 8.5%). The unemployment rate is resting at the lowest result since December 2008.
Looking at the countries in the region with data available, several of the economies saw improvements in their labor markets, including Cyprus, Germany, Ireland, Latvia, Malta, Portugal, Spain and Estonia (data refers to March). Meanwhile, the unemployment rate was unchanged in eight economies. Greece (data refers to February), Italy and Lithuania, however, saw their unemployment rates rise.
Despite the overall improvement in the Eurozone over recent years, disparities in the labor market among Eurozone countries persist. Greece is the economy in the Eurozone with by far the highest unemployment rate (20.8%, data refers to February), followed by Spain (15.9%) and Italy (11.2%). At the other end of the spectrum, Germany (3.4%) and Malta (3.3%) have the lowest unemployment rates. In addition, youth unemployment remains particularly pronounced in the periphery and came in at 45.4% in Greece (data refers to February), 34.4% in Spain and 33.1% in Italy.