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Robust German labor market

June 27, 2013

With the traditional spring pick-up still impacting the domestic labor market, unemployment in Europe’s biggest economy has dropped in the past four weeks. Analysts said the situation was gratifyingly robust.

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Man using a pneumatic hammer Copyright: imago/Caro
Image: Imago

The number of unemployed people in Germany dropped by 72,000 in June to a total of 2.865 million, the Nuremberg-based Federal Employment Agency (BA) reported Thursday.

It said the jobless rate fell by 0.2 percent month-on-month, while there was no change in a year-on-year comparison.

Overall, the German labor market remains in a good condition,” BA chief Frank-Jürgen Weise said in a statement. “It continues to develop despite a difficult economic environment," he said while conceding that recruitment levels were stronger a year ago with some 55,000 people more in employment across the nation.

Comfortable situation

In seasonally adjusted terms, unemployment dropped by 12,000 in June to 2.943 million, moving further away from the psychologically important three-million threshold.

The employment agency said it had knowledge of 437,000 vacancies on the job market, 62,000 fewer than a year earlier.

Europe's biggest economy has enjoyed a period of relatively low unemployment in contrast to many of the other European Union countries in the eurozone. Spain and Greece for example still have jobless rates above 25 percent as the debt crisis continues to bite.

hg/hc (dpa, Reuters, AFP)