Number of unemployed according to TurkStat: 4 million

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The Turkish Statistical Institute (TurkStat), the state agency commissioned with producing official statistics on the country, released its "Labor Force Statistics" for October 2020 today (January 11).

According to the TurkStat figures, the number of unemployed persons aged 15 years old and over decreased by 391 thousand to 4 million 5 thousand persons in the period of October 2020 in Turkey when compared with the same period of 2019, the previous year.

The unemployment rate occurred as 12.7 percent with 0.7 percentage point decrease. Non-agricultural unemployment rate occurred as 14.8 percent with 0.9 percentage point decrease.

Employment dropped more than unemployment

The number of employed persons decreased by 896 thousand to 27 million 447 thousand persons in the period of October 2020 compared with the same period of the previous year. The employment rate occurred as 43.6 percent with a 2.3 percentage point decrease.

According to the TurkStat data, in this period, the number of agricultural employment decreased by 242 thousand persons, industry decreased by 82 thousand persons and services decreased by 684 thousand persons while construction increased by 110 thousand persons.

According to the distribution of employment by sector; 17.6 percent was employed in agriculture, 20.3 percent in industry, 6.4 percent in construction and 55.7 percent was employed in services.

Labor force participation rate: 50 percent

The number of persons in the labor force was 31 million 452 thousand persons with 1 million 288 thousand decrease in the period of October 2020 compared with the same period of the previous year. Labor force participation rate was 50 percent with 3 percentage point decrease.

Unregistered employment: 31 percent

The ratio of persons working without any social security relating to the main job occurred 31 percent with 3.9 percentage point decrease in October 2020 compared with the same period of the previous year.

The rate of unregistered employment realized as 19.9 percent with 3.6 percentage point decrease in the non-agricultural sector.

Unemployment in 15-64 age group: 13 percent

For the 15-64 age group, the unemployment rate occurred as 13 percent with 0.7 percentage point decrease and non-agricultural unemployment rate occurred as 14.9 percent with 0.9 percentage point decrease.

In this age group, employment rate occurred as 48.5 percent with 2 percentage point decrease and labor force participation rate occurred as 55.7 percent with 2.9 percentage point decrease compared to previous year.

Youth unemployment rate: 24.9 percent

The youth unemployment rate among the ones aged 15-24 years realized as 24.9 percent with 0.4 percentage point decrease and the youth employment rate realized as 30.6 percent with 2.2 percentage point decrease when these figures were compared with the same period of the previous year.

In the same period, the labor force participation rate realized as 40.8 percent with 3 percentage point decrease. The rate of neither in employment nor in education realized as 27.6 percent with 1.6 percentage point increase compared with the same period of the previous year.

Seasonally adjusted rates

Seasonally adjusted unemployment rate realized as 12.9 percent with 0.1 percentage point increase. The number of unemployed persons increased by 39 thousand to 4 million 13 thousand persons.

Seasonally adjusted employment rate realized as 43.2 percent with 0.1 percentage point decrease. The number of employed persons estimated as 27 million 191 thousand persons with one thousand persons increase compared with the same period of the previous year.

Seasonally adjusted labor force participation rate was 49.6 percent without any change. The number of labor force estimated as 31 million 204 thousand persons with 40 thousand persons increase.

According to the seasonally adjusted number of employment by sectors, employment in agriculture increased by 6 thousand persons and industry increased by 67 thousand persons while construction decreased by 2 thousand persons and services decreased by 70 thousand persons. (HA/SD)