Spanish December Unemployment Rises to Highest in a Decade
Wednesday, January 6, 2010 @ 10:30 AM
Jan. 5 (Bloomberg) -- Spanish registered unemployment rose to the highest in more than a decade in December, capping a year that saw the nation’s jobless rate soar to double the euro- region average.
The number of people registering for unemployment benefits increased by 54,657, or 1.41 percent, from November to 3.92 million, the most since at least 1997, the earliest year for which comparable data are available. From a year earlier, unemployment climbed by 25 percent, the Labor Ministry in Madrid said today.
Spain’s jobless rate has jumped to 19.3 percent, according to European Union data, and the International Monetary Fund forecasts that it will rise above 20 percent this year. While the euro-area economy will probably expand in 2010, Spain’s government expects a full-year contraction as the real-estate market works through an excess of at least 1 million unsold homes and households pay down debt.
Government stimulus measures that helped to create more than 400,000 jobs were due to wind down at the end of last year. A project to spend 8 billion euros ($11.6 billion) on public infrastructure projects will be replaced this year by a fund half that size.
Unemployment in Spain compares with a euro-area average of 9.8 percent in October, according to the most recent EU data. Youth unemployment is more than 40 percent.
The increase in joblessness is eroding support for Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero’s Socialist Party. The opposition People’s Party would win 43.6 percent of the vote if elections were held now, compared with 38.5 percent for the Socialists, according to a poll by Sigma Dos published by El Mundo newspaper on Jan. 2.