4.8 million of Spanish jobless, unacceptable for 4th EZ economy

The government’s euphoria over labour market is based on three key points. First of all is that registers of unemployment reduced by 16,620 people in March, which means the biggest quarterly drop since year 2006. This month’s improvement is the sixth without a break. Despite all, numbers of jobless people are obviously unacceptable for fourth’s euro zone’s economy.

The second key are figures of social security ‘s affiliation, which represent the most reliable gauge in labour market. They gained an average of 84,000 people last month – the best March’s data since 2007- which makes a total of  16,296,288. Considering seasonally adjusted data, that affiliation grew by 25,475 people to an overall figure of 16,436,718. All numbers are very positive, but little negative if compared with 2007’s : then affiliation touched a record high with 20,563,218, four million more than today’s.

The third point to consider is the spending on unemployment’s subsidies. They reached €2,28 bn in February, which means a 15.8% less than the same month of 2013. This is no doubt very good for the government, but not for those thousand of citizens not receiving any unemployment benefit or pending on a social salary by the state.

Experts in labour market are not so optimistic as the government’s members that came out on Wednesday to celebrate numbers. For instance, Afi reviewed upwards its last estimations on unemployment, although they say labour recovery is to be maintained with ups and downs through current year. For 1Q14’s Labour Force Survey, experts at Afi forecast a loss of jobs near 75,000 people and also an unemployment rate increase of two percentage points to 26.2%.