The unemployment among women grew at the beginning of the year

In the previous year the unemployment decreased continuously — when in the 1st quarter the unemployment rate was 5.3%, then at the end of the year it fell to 4.1%. In the 1st quarter of 2008 the tendency of decreasing unemployment continued only among men, the situation of women on the labour market has worsened. The unemployment rate of women grew to 4.8% in the 1st quarter of this year and was bigger than that of men. First of all the non-Estonian women had problems with finding a job. Their unemployment rate increased to 8.6% in the 1st quarter.

Unemployment rate by sex, 1st quarter 2003 — 1st quarter 2008

The share of long-term unemployment decreased at the beginning of 2008 because more new persons got unemployed. If at the beginning of the last year more than half of unemployed persons had been looking for a job a year or longer, then in the 1st quarter of 2008 the share of long-term unemployment decreased to 38%.

In the 1st quarter of this year 657,000 people aged 15–74 were employed, 29,000 people were unemployed and 358,000 people were economically inactive (students, retired persons, homemakers, etc.). Compared to the 1st quarter of the previous year, the number of the employed persons grew by 10,000 persons. Employment increased due to the decline in unemployment and inactivity. Thereby only the number of employed men increased. The number of employed women decreased.

Unemployment rate is the share of the unemployed in the sum of employed and unemployed persons. The estimates are calculated on the data collected by Labour Force Survey conducted by Statistics Estonia since 1995. Every quarter 5,000 persons participate in the survey. The survey is carried out by statistical organisations in all European Union Member States on the basis of the harmonised methodology.