Unemployment for 2007 October-December trimester reaches 7.2%

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SANTIAGO.- According to an announcement made today by the National Statistics Institute, the unemployment rate for the October-December trimester of 2007 reached 7.2%, registering a drop of 0.1  percentage points compared to the previous trimester.  The rate showed a 1.2% increase compared to the same trimester during 2006.

The current unemployment rate is 0.1% above market estimates, which had projected a rate of 7.1% for the October-December trimester.

The INE has reported that the labor force has grown 3.8% in 12 months, registering its most significant change since May-June of 2005. Meanwhile, employment increased by 2.4%, equivalent to 155,030 new jobs for the period.

These figures allow for estimates that, during 2007, the labor force averaged an expansion of 2.1%, while employment averaged 2.8%, leading to a drop in the unemployment rate from an average of 7.8% in 2006 to 7.1% in 2007.