European Unemployment Reaches 10.9%

The EU27 unemployment rate reached 10.2% in March 2012, compared with 9.4% Last March. The euro area unemployment rate was 10.9% compared with 10.8% in February and 9.9% last March. The figures mean that there were 24.772m unemployed people in the EU in March 2012, 17.365m of which were in the euro area, an increase of 193,000 and 169,000 respectively compared with February and 2.123m and 1.732m respectively on March 2011. The unemployment rate ranged from 4% in Austria to 24.1% in Spain. The median was Italy at 9.8%. Youth unemployment in Europe was at 3.345m or 22.1% in the euro area and 5.516m or 22.6% in the EU27 in March 2012.