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Published: 25 June 2019

The number of employed persons grew from the year before

According to Statistics Finland’s Labour Force Survey, the number of employed people was 32,000 higher in May 2019 than one year ago. The number of unemployed persons was 249,000, which was 12,000 fewer than one year ago. The trend of the employment rate was 72.6 per cent and the trend of the unemployment rate was 6.6 per cent.

Employment rate and trend of employment rate 2009/05–2019/05, persons aged 15–64

Employment rate and trend of employment rate 2009/05–2019/05, persons aged 15–64

Unemployment and employment vary quite considerably by month and the change from the observation of the previous month mainly describes the seasonal aspect rather than the trend in development. Thus, the latest statistical data are compared to the corresponding period of the year before. By contrast, the figures of the trend series that are adjusted for seasonal and random variation are mutually comparable and phenomena associated with long-term development and cyclical changes are thus more easily observable from the trend of the time series.

The trend usually changes somewhat when the data of the following month are included in the time series. This preliminary nature of trend figures should be considered when making conclusions. The figures reported in this release are not adjusted for seasonal variation unless separately mentioned that they concern the trend. Find out more about the trend here .

The trend of the employment rate was 72.6 per cent in May and the trend of the unemployment rate was 6.6 per cent. Based on seasonally adjusted data for May, the trend of the employment rate has risen a bit and the trend of the unemployment rate has remained unchanged in recent months.

In May 2019, the number of employed persons was 2,587,000 (margin of error ±34,000), which was 32,000 higher than a year earlier. There were 29,000 more employed men and 2,000 more employed women than in May 2018.

In May 2019, the employment rate , that is, the proportion of the employed among persons aged 15 to 64, stood at 73.1 per cent, having been 72.3 per cent one year earlier. From the previous year’s May, the employment rate of men aged 15 to 64 rose by 1.4 percentage points to 74.3 per cent and that of women by 0.2 percentage points to 71.8 per cent.

According to Statistics Finland's Labour Force Survey, there were 249,000 (margin of error ±21,000) unemployed in May 2019, i.e. 12,000 fewer than one year earlier. The number of unemployed men was 133,000 and that of women 116,000.

At 8.8 per cent, the unemployment rate in May was 0.5 percentage points lower than one year earlier. The unemployment rate of men decreased by 0.1 percentage points to 9.0 per cent, and that of women by 0.9 percentage points to 8.5 per cent.

In May, there were a total of 614,000 young people aged 15 to 24 . Of them, 280,000 were employed and 117,000 unemployed. The number of young people in the active population, i.e. the employed and unemployed in total, was 397,000. In May, the unemployment rate for young people aged 15 to 24, that is, the proportion of the unemployed among the labour force, stood at 29.4 per cent, which was 1.0 percentage points higher than one year previously. The trend of the unemployment rate among young people was 16.2 per cent. The share of unemployed young people aged 15 to 24 among the population in the same age group was 19.0 per cent.

There were 1,289,000 in the inactive population in May 2019, which was 16,000 fewer than one year earlier. Of the inactive population, 95,000 persons were in disguised unemployment , which was 27,000 fewer than in May 2018.

Changes in employment 2018/05 – 2019/05 according to Statistics Finland’s Labour Force Survey, population aged 15 to 74

  Year/Month Change
2018/05 2019/05 2018/05 - 2019/05
1000 persons Per cent, %
Population total 4 122 4 125 0,1
Active population total 2 816 2 835 0,7
Employed 2 555 2 587 1,2
– employees 2 226 2 243 0,7
– self-employed persons and unpaid family workers 329 344 4,6
Unemployed 261 249 -4,8
Inactive population 1 306 1 289 –1,3
– persons in disguised unemployment 122 95 –22,3
  Per cent, % Percentage points
Employment rate, persons aged 15–64 72,3 73,1 0,8
Unemployment rate 9,3 8,8 –0,5
Activity rate 68,3 68,7 0,4
Unrounded figures are used in the Change column.
The data comply with the ILO/EU definition.

Employment Service Statistics of the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Employment

At the end of May 2019, there were altogether 227,000 persons registered in accordance with the Employment Office Regulations as job seekers at the employment and economic development offices. The number of unemployed job seekers was 15,000 lower than in May 2018.

Unemployment fell in May from the corresponding period in 2018 in the areas of all Employment and Economic Development Centres: most in South Savo (-11%), Kainuu (-11%), Ostrobothnia (-9%), Southwest Finland (-9%) and Southeast Finland (-9%). At the end of May, the number of persons fully laid off registered at the employment and economic development offices was 8,000, which was nearly the same number as twelve months earlier.

The number of persons engaged in services included in the activation rate totalled 124,000 at the end of May, which was 7,000 fewer than in May of the year before. Altogether, 4.4 per cent of the labour force was covered by labour market policy services.

There were 29,000 unemployed job seekers aged under 25 registered at the employment and economic development offices. Their number was 1,000 lower than in last year's May. During this May, 66,000 new vacancies were reported to the employment and economic development offices, which was 3,000 more than in May 2018.

Changes 2018/05–2019/05 according to the Employment Service Statistics of the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Employment

  Year/Month Change
2018/05 2019/05 2018/05 - 2019/05
1000 persons Per cent, %
Unemployed job seekers 242 227 –6,2
– unemployed over a year 77 62 –19,3
Services, total 131 124 –5,2
– employed 27 25 –6,1
– in labour market training, in training 22 22 0,8
– engaged in work/training trials 12 10 –20,6
– as a job alternation substitute, in rehabilitative work, self-motivated studies supported by unemployment benefit 69 66 –4,2
New vacancies at employment and economic development offices 63 66 5,5
Unrounded figures are used in the Change column.

Contact information for the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Employment:
Petri Syvänen, tel. +358 29 504 8050, www.tem.fi/en/employment-bulletin

Links

Labour Force Survey tables in databases

About seasonally adjusted trend

The accuracy of figures and the margins of error are explained in the quality description of the Labour Force Survey .

Comparison between the employment statistics of Statistics Finland and the Ministry of Economic Affairs and Employment

Job vacancy survey

The latest seasonally adjusted employment figures published by the EU and the latest data open job vacancies published by the EU can be found on Eurostat's home page http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat .


Source: Labour force survey 2019, May. Statistics Finland

Inquiries: Kirsi Toivonen 029 551 3535, Henri Lukkarinen 029 551 3704, tyovoimatutkimus@stat.fi

Director in charge: Jari Tarkoma

Publication in pdf-format (451.5 kB)

Tables

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Appendix tables

Figures
Quality descriptions

Updated 25.06.2019

Referencing instructions:

Official Statistics of Finland (OSF): Labour force survey [e-publication].
ISSN=1798-7857. May 2019. Helsinki: Statistics Finland [referred: 28.3.2024].
Access method: http://www.stat.fi/til/tyti/2019/05/tyti_2019_05_2019-06-25_tie_001_en.html