Unemployment rises slightly in Switzerland due to seasonal factors
Published: Thursday, Dec 5th 2024, 13:30
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Unemployment figures in Switzerland rose slightly in November. This is primarily due to seasonal factors. Overall, the Swiss labor market is still in good shape.
At the end of November, 121,114 people were registered as unemployed in the regional employment centers (RAV), as reported by the State Secretariat for Economic Affairs (Seco) on Thursday. This was 4667 or 4.0 percent more than in October and the unemployment rate rose to 2.6 percent from 2.5 percent.
The rise in unemployment is mainly due to seasonal factors, emphasized Martin Godel, who has been head of the Labour Market Unemployment Insurance division at Seco since September, during a conference call. Seasonally adjusted, the unemployment rate remained at 2.6 percent.
Depending on the time of year, seasonal fluctuations can influence the values in the labor market statistics. For example, many construction sites are closed in winter, and there is also less work in tourism in the off-season. In November, larger increases in unemployment figures were observed in the construction industry (+17%) and the hospitality industry (+9.4%).
More job seekers
Not only did the unemployment figures rise, but more people were also looking for a job in Switzerland last month. Seco counted 198,793 jobseekers. This was 4.0 percent more than in the previous month. The jobseeker rate rose to 4.3 percent from 4.2 percent previously.
Jobseekers were offered a smaller number of vacancies. The number of vacancies registered with the RAV fell by 1563 to 32,908 (-4.5%). According to Seco, 16,071 of these jobs were subject to the obligation to register, which applies to occupations with an unemployment rate of at least 5 percent.
Meanwhile, the short-time working scheme, for which data is reported with a delay, was not used too heavily in September. At 6084 people, 205 fewer were affected by short-time work than in August. The number of companies on short-time working fell by 5 to 356.
This could change, because according to Seco, the number of pre-registrations for short-time work has recently increased noticeably. In November, around 24,700 people, mainly from the manufacturing industry, were entitled to short-time work compensation. This was around 8400 more than in the previous year. However, it is important to bear in mind that not all registered employees will ultimately receive short-time working compensation.
Normalization on the labor market
The general situation on the Swiss stock market remains good, with the normalization observed by Seco over the past few months continuing. A year ago, the unemployment rate was still at a very low 2.1% and had even fallen below 2% in fall 2022 and summer 2023.
Although the seasonally adjusted unemployment figures have risen slightly for around one and a half years, the increase has slowed recently, according to Seco. According to its September economic forecast, its economists expect an average unemployment rate of 2.4% in 2024 and a slight increase to 2.6% in 2025. Seco will publish its latest forecasts on December 17.
©Keystone/SDA
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