Unemployment figures are down sharply (-11.5%) but remain exceptionally high.
In the third quarter of 2020, the number of people registered with Pôle emploi and required to look for a job (category A, B, C) amounted to 5.783.800 million people.
“Among them, 3,673,400 people are unemployed (category A), and 2,110,400 people have a reduced activity (category B, C)”, revealed this Tuesday the latest survey by Dares, the statistics service of the Ministry of Job.
In the second quarter of 2020, largely during the confinement from March 17 to May 11 - which resulted in a drop in activity, or even a complete stop in certain sectors such as hotels and restaurants -, the number of people registered with Pôle Emploi had jumped by… 815,000 (+ 24%), reaching 5.81 million people.
Unheard of in the history of these statistical series.
This surge marked the halt of three and a half years - since mid-2016 - of constant improvement on the unemployment front.
In the second quarter of 2020, there were therefore on average 55.81 million people registered with Pôle emploi in mainland France, 6.15 million including overseas.
In the third quarter, the decline is therefore a sham.
In mainland France, the number of job seekers in category A fell by -475,900 people this quarter but increased by 9.5% over one year.
The number of people exercising a short reduced activity (category B) increased by 9.7% compared to the previous quarter and over the same period that of people in reduced long activity (category C) increased by 37.7%.