In the 1st quarter of 2019, the unemployment rate stood at 6.8%, higher than the previous quarter value by 0.1 percentage points (pp) and lower than the year-on-year rate by 1.1 pp.
The unemployed population, estimated at 353.6 thousand people, increased by 1.3% (4.5 thousand) from the previous quarter and decreased by 13.8% (56.5 thousand) from the 2018 year-on-year value.
In the employed population, 4,880.2 thousand people, it was observed a quarterly decrease of 0.1% (2.8 thousand) and a year-on-year increase of 1.5% (73.5 thousand).
The youth (15 to 24 years old) unemployment rate stood at 17.6%, the lowest value of the data series started in 2011, and decreased by 2.3 pp and 4.3 pp, respectively, from the previous quarter and from the year-on-year quarter. The share of unemployed people looking for a job for 12 months or longer (long-term unemployment) was 46.8%, down 1.0 pp from the previous quarter and down 7.0 pp from the year-on-year quarter.