Jump (12.8%), soriano (10.5%) and cannelloni (9.4%) are the departments with the highest unemployment in the country, according to the latest labor market figures by geographic area of residence released by the National Institute of Statistics (INE). At the other extreme, the three departments with the lowest unemployment were: Cerro Largo (2.5%), Maldonado (2.8%) and San José (3.8%), according to March data.
According to official data, in March there were some 8,500 people from Salta who were unemployed, 4,400 in Soriano and 30,400 in Canelones. The departments that had the fewest number of unemployed were in Cerro Largo and Flores, where he estimated some 1,000 people. It should be noted that the second is the department with the lowest population in the country, while Cerro Largo has one of the lowest rates of activity (55%) and employment (53.6%) in the country.
For its part, the highest rate of activity (people who are in the labor market) was recorded in Flores (68.9%), followed by Maldonado (67.%) and Canelones (64.4%). Meanwhile, in the case of the employment rate, Maldonado (65.6%), Flores (64.3%) and San José (59.2%) also led.
Informality is around 43% in Artigas
The rate of informality in the labor market in the country shows appreciable differences depending on the area. While in Montevideo this figure reaches 13.7%, at the other extreme, Artigas is the worst in the class with an informality rate of 42.8%followed by Rivera (39.8%), Cerro Largo (35.3%) and Treinta y Tres (31.9%).
The labor market across the country
The unemployment rate across the country stood at 7.7% in March and showed a small acceleration compared to the 7.3% registered in February, according to INE data. In this way, the number of unemployed stood at 139,000 people.
While the employment and activity rate they didn’t have big changes. The employment rate of the Uruguayan economy stood at 57.1% of the population of working age, a figure that is equivalent to 1,656,000 employed persons. In February it had stood at 57.2%, so there was a slight drop in the monthly comparison.
