Number of employed and unemployed persons in August 2022 higher than one year ago

Employed and employment rate

In August 2022, the number of employed persons was 2,618,000 (margin of error ±34,000), which was 30,000 more than a year earlier. There were 10,000 more employed men and 19,000 more employed women than in August 2021.

In August, the employment rate, that is, the proportion of the employed among persons aged 15 to 64, stood at 74.2 per cent, having been 73.4 per cent one year earlier. From the previous year’s August, the employment rate of men aged 15 to 64 rose by 0.7 percentage points to 74.9 per cent and that of women went up by 1.0 percentage points to 73.5 per cent. The employment rate of people aged 20 to 69 was 72.3 per cent, having been 71.7 per cent in the year before.

Unemployed and unemployment rate

According to Statistics Finland's Labour Force Survey, there were 187,000 unemployed in August 2022 (margin of error ±22,000), i.e. 8,000 more than one year earlier. The number of unemployed men was 103,000 and that of women 84,000.

In August, the unemployment rate, the proportion of the unemployed among the labour force stood at 6.7 per cent, having been 6.5 per cent one year earlier. From the previous year’s August men’s unemployment rate rose by 0.2 percentage points to 7.0 per cent and women’s by 0.2 percentage points to 6.3 per cent.

In August, the unemployment rate for people aged 15 to 24 stood at 8.1 per cent, which was 2.0 percentage points lower than one year previously. The trend of the unemployment rate among young people was 13.5 per cent. The share of unemployed young people aged 15 to 24 among the population in the same age group was 4.2 per cent.

Inactive population

There were 1,313,000 persons aged 15 to 74 in the inactive population in August 2022, which was 42,000 fewer than one year earlier.

Seasonally adjusted trend

Employment and unemployment vary quite much 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. Therefore, only the last published time series should be used when using the trend figures. The preliminary nature of the latest trend figures should be considered when making conclusions. The fall in employment in spring 2020 was interpreted as a level shift in the seasonal adjustment model. The figures reported in this release are not adjusted for seasonal variation unless separately mentioned that they concern the trend.

Links

Ministry of Economic Affairs and Employment’s Employment bulletin

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