The unemployment rate is continuing to fall, but more slowly than expected. The unemployment rate fell by a tenth of percentage point to 7.6% of the civilian labor force during the second quarter of 2007 from 7.7% during the first quarter, the Central Bureau of Statistics reports. The unemployment rate for men fell to 7% from 7.2% and the unemployment rate for women fell to 8.3% from 8.4%.
The monthly average number of unemployed was 220,000 during the second quarter, of whom 107,400 were men and 112,600 were women.
58% of the unemployed have not worked for over a year, and 29% have not worked for at least six months.
The unemployment rate has fallen by 1.6 percentage points from 9.2% in the first quarter of 2005. The number of unemployed persons fell by 11%, a decrease of 27,900 persons.
The number of employed persons rose by 1.4% during the first half of the year to 2.68 million. Participation in the labor force rose to 56.6% in the first half from 56.1% in the second half of 2006, substantially less than the proportion in Western countries.
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes.co.il - on August 22, 2007
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