Unemployment rate in Slovakia highest since 2005

Unemployment rate in Slovakia reached 13.37 percent last month, the highest in six years, according to statistics released by the Labor, Social Affairs and the Family Center (UPSVaR) on Thursday. The unemployment rate grew by 0.25 percentage points month-on-month and 0.95 percentage points year-on-year. According to Postova Banka analyst Jana Glasova, the increase can partly be attributed to the large number of school leavers joining the ranks of the unemployed. The number of new graduates registered as unemployed in September was 34,025, which represents 8.7 percent of all 390,000 registered job applicants. However, the total number of unemployed school leavers dropped by 3.6 percent year-on-year. This could be explained by current demographics, which show a 5-percent decrease in the total numbers of people in the 15-19 age group year-on-year.