Unemployment in the euro area held steady in November, with levels not changing from the prior month. Spain ranked highest in the union with an unemployment rate of 12.4%, according to the latest figures from Eurostat, the European Union’s statistical office.
Overall, the euro area has stayed below nine-tenths of its pre-pandemic jobless level since early 2020. Across all EU member states, unemployment hovered near these levels in November, while the euro area’s rate stood at 7.4%.
The European Union as a whole also maintained a comparable unemployment rate in November, with a slight dip into the six percent range observed in the preceding month. Eurostat estimates show about 12.95 million people were unemployed in the EU in November, with roughly 10.85 million of them in the eurozone. These figures reflect a modest monthly rise in unemployment of about 10 thousand in the EU and around 2 thousand in the euro area.
When comparing against November of the previous year, the total number of unemployed people fell by about 875 thousand in the EU and by roughly 846 thousand in the euro area, signaling a continued year‑over‑year improvement in the job market across the union.
Among the member states, Spain continued to report the highest unemployment rate at 12.4%, followed by Greece at 11.4%, and Italy at 7.8%. On the other end of the spectrum, the lowest rates appeared in the Czech Republic at 2.7% and in Poland and Germany, each around 3%.
For workers under 25, the euro area’s youth unemployment rate rose in November to 15.1%. The EU as a whole mirrored that trend, edging up from 15.0% in October to 15.1%. In absolute terms, youth unemployment reached about 2.88 million in the EU, with around 2.35 million of those in the euro area.
In Spain specifically, unemployment stood at approximately 2.893 million people in November, with about 535 thousand of them under 25 years old. The youth unemployment rate in Spain remained the highest within the euro area, at 32.3%, followed by Greece at 31.3% and Italy at 23%. These figures reflect ongoing challenges in youth labor markets across several large member states, even as overall unemployment trends show gradual improvement.