Unemployment virtually unchanged in June

Almost 3.6 million people aged 15 to 74 were not in paid work in June, for a variety of reasons. In addition to the 370 thousand people who were unemployed, nearly 3.2 million people were not seeking and/or immediately available for work. Many of these are retirees and people who are unable to work due to sickness or incapacitation. These people are not counted as part of the labour force. Averaged over the past three months, the number of people outside the labour force has fallen by 5 thousand per month.

UWV: number of recipients of unemployment benefit fell by 1.7 percent in June

At the end of June 2024, UWV provided unemployment (WW) benefits to 167.8 thousand recipients. That was a drop of 3 thousand (-1.7 percent) compared to May. The number of people receiving unemployment benefits often drops at this time of year because there is more work in sectors like construction and agriculture from the spring onwards. In June, 18.7 thousand new unemployment benefits were granted, while 21.7 thousand were terminated.

UWV: fall in unemployment greatest in the construction sector

Compared to last month, the number of unemployment (WW) benefit recipients fell the most sharply in the construction sector (down by 8.0 percent), temporary employment agencies (down by 6.2 percent) and the agriculture, landscaping and fisheries sector (down by 5.3 percent). The sectors where the number of unemployment benefit recipients increased were all industrial sectors: the metal industry (up by 1.0 percent), the food, beverages and tobacco industry (up by 0.6 percent) and other manufacturing (up by 0.3 percent). In absolute numbers, however, the increases in these sectors were limited.

Labour force has grown by 160 thousand over past year

The unemployment rate has been hovering at around 3.6 since the summer of 2023. Over the same period, net labour participation has increased slightly, reaching 73.4 percent in the past three months. Because the population has also been growing, 88 thousand more people were in employment in June 2024 than one year earlier. Meanwhile, the number of unemployed was 17 thousand higher. That means the total labour force grew by 105 thousand.

Unemployment rate stable

Unemployment trends are the result of underlying movements between those in employment, the unemployed and those who are not part of the labour force. This is visualised in the chart below. The graph below the chart shows the changes in these different flows over the past few months.

Unemployment can increase or decrease due to four different changes in people’s circumstances. Two of these can lead to lower unemployment. The first change occurs when an unemployed person finds a job. The second change takes place when an unemployed person stops seeking work and leaves the labour market. In June 2024, 235 thousand people who had been unemployed three months previously, found employment.

There are also two movements in the opposite direction, which can lead to higher unemployment. The first happens when an employed person loses their job and the second when a person who was previously unavailable for work decides to seek employment. If people in these groups do not find work immediately, they become part of the unemployed labour force. The total number of people who became unemployed in June (234 thousand) was almost equal to the number of people who left the unemployed labour force. As such, the number of unemployed persons has hardly changed over the past three months. Unemployment rose slightly in the first few months of 2024, mainly because more people from outside the labour force decided to seek employment, but did not find a job immediately.

Every month, CBS publishes figures on the labour force in accordance with guidelines of the International Labour Organization (ILO). The corresponding indicators, i.e. the employed and unemployed labour force, are used around the world to describe cyclical developments on the labour market. Monthly figures are essential in this respect. In addition, UWV issues its own monthly figures on unemployment benefit. The figures released by UWV do not correspond directly with the labour force indicators. For more details on the different sources, see our technical explanation (in Dutch only).