Eurozone unemployment hits highest level

Economics - 31 January 2012, Tuesday 15:09

BRUSSELS (QHA) - Eurozone jobless rate has reached its highest level since the introduction of euro single currency. The relevant data were shown on Tuesday, a day after EU leaders promised to focus on creating millions of new jobs to try to kick-start Europe’s economy, according to Reuters.
In December last year, seasonally adjusted unemployment among the 17 eurozone countries rose to 10.4 percent, on a par with an upwardly revised November figure, the European Union’s statistics office Eurostat said.
It was the highest rate since June 1998, before the introduction of the euro in 1999.
After two years of a deep debt crisis and budget austerity, the number of Europeans out of work has risen to 16.5 million people, with another 20,000 people without a job in December from the month before. The rate steadily crept up through 2011 as growth stalled and recession loomed.
At a summit on January 30, European leaders tried to shift the debate from fighting the debt crisis to reviving growth in a bloc that produces 16 percent of global economic output.
They are looking to deploy 82 billion euros of unspent funds from the EU's 2007-2013 budget in an attempt to boost employment. But most economists expect scant progress while the euro zone's high debtors are compelled to persist with harsh austerity programmes.
A growing gap between the wealthy nations of northern Europe and those of the poorer, less productive south overshadows any EU-wide growth and jobs policies implemented from

 
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