CSO: Women most unemployed as unemployment rises

The unemployment rate at the end of the last quarter of 2015 was 3.4 percent.

In a release issued yesterday, the CSO said the information was based on data collected in the Continuous Sample Survey of Population conducted during the April to June 2016.

From a gender perspective, the CSO said that the unemployment rate among males increased from 3.7 percent to 4.1 percent, while among females, it increased from 3.8 percent to 4.9 percent for the same period. Compared to the similar quarter a year earlier, the data showed that the overall unemployment rate increased from 3.2 percent to 4.4 percent.

The registered labour force at the end of the second quarter was 640,900 persons. This represented a decrease of 1,000 or 0.2 percent when compared to the first quarter of 2016, the CSO said.

From a gender perspective, the release said, the decrease in the labour force was reflected among females.

“The data shows that males increased by 900 or 0.2 percent while females decreased by 1,900 or 0.7 percent,” the CSO said.

In addition, the overall labour force participation rate dropped to 60.0 percent in the second quarter of 2016 compared with the corresponding quarter in 2015 when the overall labour force participation rate was 61 percent.

According to the CSO, the survey data showed a decrease of 5,400 or 0.9 percent in the number of persons with jobs, in the quarter under review.

From a gender perspective, the number of employed males decreased by 700 or 0.2 percent while the number of employed females decreased by 4,700 or 1.8 percent. When compared to the corresponding quarter a year earlier, the data showed a decrease of 16,200 or 2.6 percent in the total number of employed persons in TT.