An ageing population and emigration have a lot to do with the marginal drop in Portugal’s unemployment figures which in the last quarter of 2013 was 15.3%.
After starting 2013 with the highest unemployment rate ever seen, combined with mass job losses, the unemployment rate of 15.3% compared with 16.9% in the last quarter of 2012. This is the first time since 2008 that employment showed a year-on-year growth, interrupting a period of five and a half years of decline but much of this is due to emigration.
Analysts urge caution as part of the decline in unemployment can be explained by the reduction of the working population due to emigration.
The data released yesterday by the National Statistics Institute (INE) show that the number of unemployed dropped by 97,000 people. But of these, only 30,000 actually went to jobs. The remaining 67,000 emigrated, or simply singed off having given up looking for a job.
"The working population, those aged between 15 and 65, decreased by more 100,000 in 2013 as many emigrated. The decline in unemployment is due in large part to a decrease in the workforce, only one third is due to actual net job creation," commented the chief economist at the University of Minho.
The economist and former Minister of Labour, Bagão Felix, did the maths as well and could find no other explanation for the reduction in the number of unemployed than emigration, although he did point out that for the first time in recent years the economy is creating jobs.
To Bagão Felix the increasing number of unemployed jobseekers that have been looking for more than a year, "reveals a worrying divide" at a time when social support and protection has been eroded.
Prime Minister and Minister for the Economy are both well aware of the affect that emigration has had on making the unemplyoment headline figures look better than they are as both recently have urged caution about a resurgence in the economy and expressed concern that the key economic indicators may not be sustainable.
