Eurozone unemployment holds steady at record low

Unemployment across the eurozone held steady in August at the record-low rate of 6.4%, according to figures from Eurostat on Wednesday.

The jobless rate, which fell to the current level in July, was in line with economists' predictions.

Eurozone unemployment, which surged to a peak of 8.6% during the height of the Covid-19 pandemic in September 2020, has been on a steadily declining path since mid-2021. It has remained below the 7.0% mark for the past 20 months.

Eurostat reported that there were a total of 10.93m people across the single-currency bloc registered as unemployed during August, down 94,000 from the month before. The report showed that 233,000 fewer people are now unemployed than a year ago, when the jobless rate was 6.6%.

Youth unemployment – defined as young persons under the age of 25 – fell to 14.1% in August, from 14.2% the previous month, with the total number of unemployed falling 31,000 to 2.23m.

The highest rate of overall unemployment across member states continued to be seen in Spain, though the jobless rate declined to 11.3% from 11.4% previously, while the lowest rate was registered in Malta at 3.0%, albeit up from 2.9% the month before.

Across the wider European Union, the unemployment rate declined to 5.9% in August from 6.0% in July.