ILO indicates 5% unemployment rate in Switzerland

ILO unemployment over 5% in Switzerland, more than 10% for young people Keystone-SDA

Unemployment as defined by the International Labour Organisation (ILO) increased to 5.2% in Switzerland in the third quarter of the year.

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For young people, the rate is more than double and foreigners also show a high level. Switzerland thus has a higher unemployment rate than many European countries, Germany first and foremost.

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As far as the total number of workers is concerned, there was an increase of 0.5 points compared to the April-June period and 0.3 points year-on-year. Concretely, there were 261,000 unemployed in the period under review, i.e. 10.2% more than in the second quarter and 8.0% more than in the same period of 2024.

At the level of age groups, the rate of 10.5% (+2.9 points quarterly, -0.4 points annually) for 15-24 year-olds stands out in particular, while joblessness is lower among 50-64 year-olds, who score 3.4% (-0.1 and +0.2 points). There are also significant differences between foreigners (8.6%) and Swiss (3.6%), while there is no difference between women and men (both 5.1%).

As is well known, an unemployed person in the sense of the ILO is defined as a person who is not employed, has looked for a job in the previous four weeks and is available for work: this is determined by surveys.

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By way of comparison, the unemployment rate calculated monthly by the State Secretariat for Economic Affairs (which is based instead on the registrations at the regional employment offices) gives a much rosier picture: according to Seco’s calculations, the rate stood at 2.7% in July, 2.8% in August and also 2.8% in September.

The ILO indicator has the advantage of allowing international comparisons to be made: the Swiss rate is thus lower than that of the EU (5.9%), the eurozone (6.3%), France (7.6%) or Italy (5.5%), but higher than that of several countries, including Germany (4.0% and 8.6% for young people), Poland (3.1%), Bulgaria (3.2%), Slovenia (3.1%) and the Czech Republic (3.0%).

Also in the third quarter, the number of long-term unemployed (i.e. for a year or more) according to the ILO stood at 84,000, up by 4,000 compared to the same period in 2024. The share of long-term unemployed in the total number of jobless fell from 33.0% to 32.1%. The median duration of unemployment decreased from 213 to 192 days.

The figures emerge from the Swiss Labour Force Survey (RIFOS) drawn up by officials in Neuchâtel, which also highlights changes in total employment: 5.4 million people were in work in the quarter under review, a figure that was stable compared to three months earlier and up by 0.4% year-on-year.

Translated from Italian by DeepL/mga

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