Estonia reported the highest increase in employment rate in the European Union in the second quarter of 2024, compared to the previous quarter, seeing a 1.1 percentage point rise, according to new data from Eurostat.
Other countries to see a notable increase in employment rate included Lithuania (+0.9 percentage points) and Czechia (+0.8 percentage points).
Six EU countries reported a quarter-on-quarter decline in employment rate, with Slovenia (-0.7 percentage points) and Finland (-0.4 percentage points) seeing the biggest declines.
The unemployment rate remained unchanged in Italy, Poland and Slovakia.
Overall, in the second quarter of 2024, the employment rate for people aged 20-64 in the European Union was 75.8%, a 0.2 percentage point increase from the first quarter of 2024, Eurostat noted.
Labour market slack, which includes those with unmet employment needs such as unemployed individuals, stood at 11.0% of the extended labour force aged 20-64, a decrease of 0.1 percentage points from the previous quarter.
Elsewhere, recent data shows that Malta has the highest percentage of recent graduates entering the workforce, with 95.8% now employed. Other European countries with a high percentage of recent graduates in employment include the Netherlands (93.2%), Germany (91.5%), Austria (89.0%), Ireland (88.7%), and Hungary (87.9%).
| Country | 2023-Q1 | 2023-Q2 |
|---|---|---|
| Belgium | 72.3 | 71.6 |
| Bulgaria | 76.6 | 76.3 |
| Czechia | 81.3 | 82.0 |
| Denmark | 80.1 | 79.6 |
| Germany | 80.9 | 81.3 |
| Estonia | 82.4 | 82.3 |
| Ireland | 79.1 | 79.4 |
| Greece | 67.3 | 67.4 |
| Spain | 69.8 | 70.6 |
| France | 74.3 | 74.5 |
| Croatia | 70.2 | 70.9 |
| Italy | 65.9 | 66.1 |
| Cyprus | 79.7 | 79.6 |
| Latvia | 77.1 | 77.6 |
| Lithuania | 77.7 | 79.0 |
| Luxembourg | 75.0 | 75.4 |
| Hungary | 80.6 | 80.7 |
| Malta | 80.8 | 80.6 |
| Netherlands | 83.5 | 83.5 |
| Austria | 77.2 | 77.2 |
| Poland | 77.6 | 77.7 |
| Portugal | 77.5 | 78.0 |
| Romania | 68.7 | 68.5 |
| Slovenia | 76.5 | 78.0 |
| Slovakia | 77.4 | 77.5 |
| Finland | 78.5 | 78.6 |
| Sweden | 82.7 | 82.7 |
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