The OECD area unemployment rate was steady at 8.1% in May, unchanged for the third consecutive month. The Euro area unemployment rate was also stable at 9.9% for the third consecutive month.
Most OECD countries confirm the general pattern of steady or falling unemployment rates although Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Italy, Luxembourg, Spain, Sweden and the United States recorded small increases in their May unemployment rates. New June 2011 data for the United States show a further rise of 0.1 percentage point to 9.2%.
Countries experiencing continuously high unemployment rates include Ireland (14.0%), Portugal (12.4%), the Slovak Republic (13.3%) and Spain (20.9%).
There were 44.0 million unemployed persons in OECD countries in May 2011, down 2.8 million from May 2010 but still 12.0 million higher than in May 2008.
Selected Unemployment Rates, s.a.
April 2011 – May 2011 (1)
(1) United Kingdom: February 2011—March 2011.
Methodological Notes:
For methodological reasons, harmonised unemployment rates may differ from those published by national statistical institutes. All rates and levels quoted are seasonally adjusted (s.a.).
More methodological notes are available at http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/21/0/44743407.pdf.
Access data:
The latest unemployment rates for all OECD countries and geographic groupings, as well as historical data, can be downloaded from the OECD online data dissemination facility OECD.Stat Extracts at: http://stats.oecd.org/wbos/Default.aspx?QueryName=251&QueryType=View&Lang=en.
Contacts:
For further information readers are invited to contact the OECD’s Media Relations Division on
(33) 1 45 24 97 00 or e-mail news.contact@oecd.org
For technical questions contact stat.contact@oecd.org
Next release: Tuesday, 13 September 2011
