Irish employment stagnates in 2016; Broad jobless rate @ 17%

Ireland: Irish job creation effectively stagnated in the 6 months to the first quarter of 2016. There was an annual increase in employment of 2.4% or 46,900 in the year to the first quarter of 2016, bringing total employment to 1,976,500 according to the CSO's Quarterly National Household Survey.

However, in the first six months of the 12-month period 54,000 jobs were added in April-September.

The CSO said that unemployment fell by 33,300 (-15.7%) in the year to Q1 2016 bringing the total number of persons unemployed to 179,500, based on the International Labour Organisation definition of paid work being at least 1 hour per week.

The long-term unemployment rate decreased from 6.0% to 4.7% over the year to Q1 2016. Long-term unemployment accounted for 56.1% of total unemployment in Q1 2016 compared with 59.7% a year earlier and 60.5% in the first quarter of 2014.

The total number of persons in the labour force in the first quarter of 2016 was 2,156,000, representing an increase of 13,600 (+0.6%) over the year. The number of persons not in the labour force in Q1 2016 was 1,470,200, an increase of 5,300 (+0.4%) over the year.

The seasonally adjusted official unemployment rate decreased from 9.0% to 8.3% over the quarter.

Export sectors

Industry added 4,000 in the year; Information and Communications (ICT) added 3,000 and employment in Accommodation and food service activities rose 10,000.

Compared with Q1 2008, employment in Industry is down 34,000; employment in ICT is up 13,000 and Accommodation and food service activities (partly reflecting tourism) is up 10,000.

Broad rate of unemployment

In Q1 2016 there were 80,000 people in official activation programmes compared with 52,000 in Q1 2008.

There were 99,000 part-time workers seeking full-time work.

The broad rate of unemployment was at 17%.