Labour Market Development During the Financial and Economic Crisis

The ongoing financial market and economic crisis has caused the producing economy to experience its deepest slump in 50 years. The Austrian labour market has been responding by a decrease in employment and a substantial increase in unemployment, both of which are expected to continue well into 2010. A phase of pronounced employment expansion from 2006 to 2008, when the job count on average rose by more than 2 percent a year, was followed by an equally clear-cut collapse in employment ( 1.3 percent) and a dramatically increasing unemployment rate (by 1.3 percentage points to 7.1 percent; or if training courses are included by 1.6 percentage points to 8.8 percent).