BUDAPEST: The Central Statistics Office (KSH) said today that the average unemployment rate among Hungarians between the ages of 15 and 74 dropped to 7.8% in January-March, from the 8.3% of the same period a year earlier, but increased from 7.7% in December-February,.
The office added that the number of employed young people aged 15–24 years was 264,000, and their employment rate increased by 1.3 percentage points to 23.9%. The number of employed people in the ‘best working age’, i.e. the group aged 25–54 years, and those 55–64 years of age increased as well, with the employment rate growing by 1.3 percentage points to 79.5% in the former and by 2.8 percentage points to 43.0% in the latter age group, KSH said.
The National Employment Office (NFSZ) said on its website last Friday that approximately 462,000 job seekers were registered in Hungary at the end of March, up from 431,500 a year earlier and 430,700 at the end of the previous month. The NFSZ said 22.1% of this group had been seeking work for more than one year, down 6.4 percentage points from a year earlier.