The number of unemployed in Germany fell by 27,000 to 2.723 million in May compared to April. That is 179,000 more unemployed than in May last year, The Federal Employment Agency (BA) announced on Tuesday in Nuremberg The unemployment rate fell by 0.2 percentage points to 5.8 percent compared to April.
For the statistics, the Federal Agency used data that was available up to the middle of the month. “The spring recovery has not really got going this year,” said BA head Andrea Nahles. Although unemployment and underemployment also fell in May, they did not fall as sharply as in most previous years. Seasonally adjusted, the number of unemployed in May rose by 25,000 compared to the previous month.
Less short-time work in May
The demand for workers also fell. In May, 702,000 vacancies were reported to the Federal Employment Agency – 65,000 fewer than a year ago. According to the Federal Employment Agency, the number of employees subject to social insurance contributions is still at a high level. According to current projections, the number fell slightly by 3,000 from February to March. Compared to the same period last year, however, the number was 134,000 higher at 34.81 million employees. According to statistics experts, this increase is due solely to foreign employees.
In May, fewer companies reported short-time work than in April: From May 1 to 28, employers applied for this for 46,000 employees – a quarter less than in the previous month. It is not possible to predict at this point how many companies will actually use short-time work. The BA has preliminary extrapolated data up to March: In that month, 219,000 employees received short-time work benefits, compared to 200,000 in February and 189,000 in January.