Saturday, June 2nd 2012 - 02:49 UTC

Euro zone unemployment hits a new record low: 17.4 million out of work

Euro zone unemployment has hit a record high, and job losses are likely to keep climbing as the bloc's devastating debt crisis eats away at businesses' ability to hire workers while indebted governments continue to cut staff.

In Austria the rate fell to 3.9% but in Spain it remains at almost 25%

Around 17.4 million people were out of work in the 17-nation Euro zone in April, or 11% of the working population, the highest level since records began in 1995, the EU statistics office Eurostat said on Friday.

Although April's joblessness level was the same as March, as Eurostat revised upwards its earlier reading of 10.9% for the month, another 110,000 people were out of work in April and the jobless rate has risen every month over the past year.

While unemployment fell in Austria to just 3.9% in April, it rose to 24.3% in Spain, the highest in the Euro zone. New data for stricken Greece was not immediately available, having reached 21.7% in February.

The number of people out of work also crept up in France and Italy to 10.2% in April, the Euro zone's second- and third-largest economies respectively.

Joblessness in Germany fell to 5.4% of the working population from 5.5% in March, although economists say given the weakening business sentiment, even Europe's largest economy cannot expect unemployment to fall much further.
 

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1 Teaboy2 (#) Jun 02nd, 2012 - 07:46 am Report abuse
Title - “Euro zone unemployment hits a new record LOW: 17.4 million out of work”

Start of First Sentence in Article - “Euro zone unemployment has hit a record HIGH”

Well which one is it Mercopress lol
2 Malvinero1 (#) Jun 02nd, 2012 - 01:25 pm Report abuse
I think thay meant :“Employment hit a record low”
17.4 million unemployed...3 million from uk!
3 Raymo (#) Jun 03rd, 2012 - 12:29 am Report abuse
@2 Malvinero1 You must be really thick! the article was about unemployment in the Euro zone, the UK is not in the Euro Zone.

Typical Argie always getting the FACTS wrong!!!
4 Malvinero1 (#) Jun 04th, 2012 - 01:38 am Report abuse
@2 Malvinero1 You must be really thick! the article was about unemployment in the Euro zone, the UK is not in the Euro Zone.

You are rigth,uk is OUT of EUROPE!(DOES not having the EURO will qualify uk for that?
So Unemployment is worse in Europe,17.4 +3 million about 20.4 millions
5 Teaboy2 (#) Jun 04th, 2012 - 08:39 am Report abuse
Maviner

The EU and the Euro Zone are two different things, the EU is political organisation of member states (27 in all including the UK).

The Euro Zone is just a group of countries inside the EU, whom share the same currency. Not all EU countires are in the Euro Zone.

By your logic, because Denmark, opt-out to joing the Euro Currency, they to are not part of Europe, despite the fact they are joined at the hip with Germany. Its also worth noting that the Eurozone also includes 2 non EU countries Solvakia and Solvenia - Both of which are outside on the EU but are still european nations.

The reason many of us brits do not see ourselves as european, is because we are not joined to the rest of europe by land, we are an island on the edge of Europe that has for centuries been at war with the likes of Spain (we won every time) and France (again, we won every time) and off course more recently with Germany in 2 world wars (both of which germany lost). End of the day ur culture is very different to the rest of the other EU nations cultures and thats what makes us British and not european.

In fact the majority of the brits, could careless about what happens in the EU or Eurozone, we want out of the EU. Sure if the Euro Zone collasped and the EU split up, it would hit our economy, but because out economy is strong, it will simply absord the impact and bounce back within 2-3 years, which i pointed out on these very boards over 6 months ago.

You keep saying the UK is finished, sorry but just because a car goes over a bump in the road, it doesn't mean the wheels will fall off. And right now the UK economy has simply hit a bit of a bumpy road - Where as argentina's economy is griding to a halt as it has simply ran out of fuel and is now just being pushed along down hill your politicians. But once they start trying to push uphill (such as when they run out of options to save the economy) then your economy will collapse as it will have stalled.

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