Youth unemployment rate exceeds 10 percent

Posted on : 2010-03-18 11:49 KST Modified on : 2019-10-19 20:29 KST
An NSO report says the job market dropout and overall unemployment rates are still on the rise
 while the lower line shows the total unemployment rate (scale: percent).
while the lower line shows the total unemployment rate (scale: percent).

The unemployment rate of youth reached a ten-year record high after it was recorded at over 10 percent. The total rate of unemployment also continues to reveal instability in the job market, as it exceeded the 1 million mark for the second month in a row.

According to the “Employment Trends in February” report released by the National Statistics Office (NSO) on March 17, the youth unemployment rate (those ages 15 to 29 years old) soared to 10.0 percent, a record high since February 2000 when the rate was recorded at 10.1 percent. The total number of unemployed youth was 433 thousand people in February, which was a 61 thousand increase from January.

The number of job market dropouts also surpassed the previous record set in January 1999, when the NSO first began collecting data for those statistics. The number of job market dropouts increased to 253 thousand, a 49.8 percent increase from February 2009.

The total unemployment rate for February reached 4.9 percent, which was a 1 percent increase from January. The total number of unemployed individuals also increased by 244 thousand people from February of last year to total 1.17 million unemployed individuals.

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