It’s just a marginal increase, but one that ends Portugal’s 20-month run of shrinking unemployment.
According to the National Statistics Institute (INE), Portugal’s unemployment levels increased 0.1% in October compared to the previous month, now placing at 13.4%. That means approximately 688,300 people were jobless last month.
On the other hand, the country’s employment numbers in October (4.4 million) remained very similar to September. Diário Económico newspaper downplayed the increase, saying it was more likely caused by more people, such as students, beginning to look for work than necessarily people having lost their jobs.
As the paper stressed, one has to be “actively looking for a job” to be considered unemployed.
Data elsewhere however shows that 6,300 men and 3,200 women lost their jobs in October. Unemployment is still higher for women (14%) than it is for men (12.8%).
This was the first time that INE has released a monthly bulletin on Portugal’s employment situation. The country is usually updated by the European Commission’s statistical office Eurostat, using INE’s three-monthly bulletins and data from Portugal’s Institute for Employment and Professional Training (IEFP).
Unemployment nudges up again
