In April, 134,396 jobs were created in Spain. The unemployment rate fell by 39,012; almost 1% lower than the month before. The number of temporarily unemployed people (within the ERTE scheme) also decreased significantly.
The Ministry of Social Security and Employment recently published the monthly figures. Normally, April is a favourable month for the Spanish labour market with the start of the tourist season, rising temperatures and the celebration of Semana Santa. Despite job growth not being comparable to other years, due to the pandemic, unemployment declined for the second consecutive month.
Fewer temporarily unemployed
In total, the working population in Spain now consists of more than 19,055,298 people. The registered jobseekers total 3,910,628 Of the 900,000 jobs lost in Spain in the past year, nearly 600,000 have now been created. Another positive trend shows a decrease in the number of people with a temporarily terminated employment contract. At the end of April, 638,283 people were in the ERTE scheme. This is a drop of 36,600 on the month before. A year ago, during the first corona wave, ERTE affected nearly 3.4 million employees.
ERTE renewal
This month, the Spanish government will again enter into negotiations with social partners for an extension of this labour protection measure. For travel agencies (58.26% of employees in this sector are in ERTE), the tourism accommodation sector (52.12%), the transport sector (41.99%) and the gambling industry (33.85%) in particular, an extension of ERTE is essential.
In April, the number of jobs increased in all major economic sectors. This was especially tha case in the services sector, where 99,404 workers were able to return to work. In agriculture, livestock and fishing the figure was 13,483 and in the industrial sector another 8,544. In the hospitality industry, employment increased by 4.12%.
Balearic Islands record largest job growth
The greatest job growth was in the following autonomous regions: Balearic Islands (+2.75%), Murcia (1.44%), Navarre (1.17%) and Extremadura (1.15%) .
