Press Release Quarterly National Household Survey Quarter 1 2016

Date Published: Tue, 24 May 2016

Number of Persons in Employment  

• There was an annual increase in employment of 2.4% or 46,900 in the year to the first quarter of 2016, bringing total employment to 1,976,500.
• On a seasonally adjusted basis, employment increased by 15,400 (+0.8%) over the previous quarter. This follows on from a seasonally adjusted increase in employment of 6,600 (+0.3%) in Q4 2015.

Number of Persons Unemployed  

• The seasonally adjusted unemployment rate decreased from 9.0% to 8.3% over the quarter.
• Unemployment decreased by 33,300 (-15.7%) in the year to Q1 2016 bringing the total number of persons unemployed to 179,500.
• The long-term unemployment rate decreased from 6.0% to 4.7% over the year to Q1 2016. Long-term unemployment accounted for 56.1% of total unemployment in Q1 2016 compared with 59.7% a year earlier and 60.5% in the first quarter of 2014.

Labour Force

• The total number of persons in the labour force in the first quarter of 2016 was 2,156,000, representing an increase of 13,600 (+0.6%) over the year. The number of persons not in the labour force in Q1 2016 was 1,470,200, an increase of 5,300 (+0.4%) over the year.

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