The number of unemployed people in Slovakia increased by 8,300 to 152,800 in the second quarter of this year, up 5.8 percent year-on-year (y-o-y), the Statistics Office
reported on Wednesday, adding that unemployment rate increased by 0.3 percentage points (p.p.) y-o-y to 5.6 percent.
Seasonally adjusted, the number of unemployed fell by 1.4 percent to 156,700 people when compared to the first quarter of this year.
Concerning the structure of the unemployed, the long-term unemployed (out of work for one year or more) continued to dominate, accounting for 65 percent of the total figure. While their number increased by 9.6 percent y-o-y, it remained just shy of 100,000 people.
The largest share of unemployed people had previously worked in industry (19.3 percent), retail (9.1 percent) and construction (7.8 percent). Industry recorded the largest y-o-y increase in the number of unemployed people (6,200), followed by the construction sector (3,700).
The regions reporting the highest levels of unemployment were Banska Bystrica, Košice and Prešov, with the number of jobless people exceeding 30,000 in each of them, while unemployment rates ranged from 9.8 percent to 8.4 percent. These three regions accounted for almost two thirds of all unemployed people in Slovakia.
In the first half of this year, the number of unemployed increased by 8.1 percent to 157,300, while the unemployment rate rose to 5.7 percent.
Source: TASR
