Unemployment on the Increase: 4 Million 566 People Unemployed in Turkey

* Photo: AA

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The Turkish Statistical Institute (TurkStat) released its Labor Force Statistics for September 2019 today (December 16).

Accordingly, the number of unemployed people at the age of 15 and older increased by 817 thousand to 4 million 566 thousand in September 2019 when compared with the same month last year. In September, the unemployment rate was 13.8 percent, marking a 2.4 point increase.

The TurkStat data have also shown that in the same period, non-agricultural unemployment rate occurred as 16.4 percent with a 2.9 point increase.

While youth unemployment rate including the ones aged 15-24 was 26.1 percent with a 4.5 point increase, the unemployment rate for people aged 15-64 occurred as 14.1 percent with a 2.4 point increase.

Employment rate: 46.1 percent

In September, the number of employed decreased by 623 thousand to 28 million 440 thousand people when compared with the same period last year. The employment rate was 46.1 percent with a 1.7 point decrease.

The number of agricultural employment decreased by 108 thousand people and the number of non-agricultural employment decreased by 516 thousand people in this period, according to the TurkStat data.

According to the distribution of employment by sector; 19.3 percent was employed in agriculture, 19.5 percent was in industry, 5.5 percent was employed in construction and 55.7 percent was employed in services.

Employment in agriculture increased by 0.1 percentage point, services increased by 1.4 percentage point while industry decreased by 0.1 percentage point and construction decreased by 1.4 percentage point in comparison with the same period in 2018.

Labour force participation rate: 53.5 percent

In September 2019, the number of people in the labour force was 33 million 6 thousand, marking an increase of 193 thousand people increase when compared with the same period of the previous year.

Labour force participation rate was 53.5 percent with a 0.5 point decrease. While this rate for men was 72.6 percent with a 0.9 point decrease, the rate for woman was 34.9 percent without any change compared with last year.

* Seasonally adjusted main labour force indicators, September 2018, September 2019

Rate of unregistered employment: 36 percent

The ratio of people working without any social security relating to the main job was 36.0 percent with a 2.2 point increase in the period of September 2019 compared with the same period of the previous year.

In the non-agricultural sector, the rate of unregistered employment was 23.6 percent with a 1.6 point increase compared to the same period in 2018.

Seasonally adjusted employment rates

Seasonally adjusted employed people increased by 36 thousand, thereby reaching 28 million 111 thousand people when compared with the previous period. In September 2019, seasonally adjusted employment rate was 45.6 percent without any change.

The number of seasonally adjusted unemployed persons decreased by 73 thousand to 4 million 553 thousand persons when compared with September 2018. The unemployment rate was 13.9 percent with a 0.2 point decrease.

* Non-seasonally adjusted main labour force indicators, September 2018, September 2019

Seasonally adjusted labour force participation rate was 53.0 percent with 0.1 point decrease compared with the previous period. According to the number of employment by sector, employment in agriculture increased by 7 thousand people, construction increased by 2 thousand people and services increased by 31 thousand people while industry decreased by 5 thousand people. (HA/SD)

* Source: TurkStat