Overall employment situation improved, despite high-profile layoffs

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Extensive layoffs by Finnish companies have not had a negative effect on Finland's overall employment situation.
      In January the employment level was 2.2 percentage points higher than at the same time in the previous year - 69.3 per cent. In January 2.5 million people in Finland were employed. The unemployment level declined by nearly one percentage point to 6.8 per cent.
      Jaakko Kiander, director of the Labour Institute of Economic Research, sees the growth in employment by 100,000 in oen year as unprecedented.
      "Such growth in employment in a single year exceeds all forecasts. The government has already reached its goal in increasing employment", Kiander says.
     
Last autumn and in the early part of this year many companies announced personnel cutbacks. In January the pulp and paper manufacturer Stora Enso gave notice to nearly 1,000 employees.
      On the other hand, hiring at the peak of the economic cycle considerably exceeded the personnel cutbacks. However, not all of the announced redundancies appeared in the January statistics, because mandatory talks with personnel on the details of the cutbacks are still going on.
      "It may be hard for the public at large following the news to comprehend that the number of people at work has grown in spite of the large layoffs. Cutbacks by individual companies have little significance in these numbers. Demand for labour in the service sector partially compensates for the reductions in industry."
     
In January there were nearly 2.5 million people working in Finland; 73 per cent of them worked in the private sector.
      Kiander feels that it is clear that signs of a slowdown in the world economy will soon be reflected in Finland's job figures as well.
      "It is quite certain that growth in employment will slow down in the coming year. The reduction of jobs is most likely in industry, which competes on the international market."
      The unemployment level among young people aged 15 to 24 declined in January by one percentage point to 17.7 per cent.
      Kiander says that in the youth employment situation, there have been some problems in supply meeting demand. However, he considers it likely that more young people will get work in the service sector. "Consumer confidence is strong in Finland, and it maintains demand in the service sector", Kiander says.
     
Regionally, the unemployment level was lowest in the province of South Finland, where 5.5 per cent of the workforce was without a job. The situation was worst in East Finland, where the unemployment level was 11.1 per cent. In Finnish Lapland, the figure was 9.8 per cent.
      "We would have full employment if the nationwide unemployment rate were at the same level as in the south of Finland. In 1989 the unemployment rate in Uusimaa was 2.5 per cent, and in Helsinki it was one per cent", Kiander notes.


Previously in HS International Edition:
  Unemployment rate slides under 6% in August (18.9.2007)

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