{"id":39699,"date":"2025-08-02T09:59:15","date_gmt":"2025-08-02T09:59:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/39699\/"},"modified":"2025-08-02T09:59:15","modified_gmt":"2025-08-02T09:59:15","slug":"finlands-unemployment-rate-ranks-second-highest-in-eu-yle-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/39699\/","title":{"rendered":"Finland’s unemployment rate ranks second highest in EU | Yle News"},"content":{"rendered":"

The change is largely due to declining unemployment in Southern Europe, while Finland’s rate has climbed.<\/p>\n

\"A<\/p>\n

Open image viewer<\/p>\n

High interest rates have stalled sectors like construction. Image: Kalle Niskala \/ Yle<\/p>\n

Finland’s unemployment rate (9.9%) has surged to one of the highest in Europe, surpassed only by Spain (10.4%), according to fresh Eurostat data. The figures mark a shift from previous years, when high joblessness was concentrated in Southern European countries like Greece, Portugal and Italy.<\/p>\n

The change is largely due to declining unemployment in Southern Europe, while Finland’s rate has climbed. Remarkably, Finland and Sweden (8.3%) overtook Greece (7.9%), which had previously held the second-highest unemployment rate in the EU.<\/p>\n

“This situation is perverse \u2013 we’re not used to seeing this,” commented Elina Pylkk\u00e4nen, Under-Secretary of State at Finland’s Ministry of Economic Affairs and Employment.<\/p>\n

The current Finnish unemployment rate is well above the EU average, a reversal that experts attribute to several factors.<\/p>\n

According to Statistics Finland’s latest Labour Force Survey, there were 27,000 more unemployed people<\/a> in the second quarter of 2025 than in the same period last year.<\/p>\n

Stimulus money bypassed the north<\/p>\n

One major factor is the EU’s 750 billion euro Covid recovery package. According to Pylkk\u00e4nen, the funding disproportionately benefited Southern Europe.<\/p>\n

While Spain, Italy and others received significant grants, Finland and other Nordic countries were left with comparatively little. These funds helped kickstart economic recovery and job creation in the south.<\/p>\n

Sweden, Finland’s neighbour, is also facing rising unemployment and is among the eurozone’s worst performers.<\/p>\n

High interest rates hurt Finland’s economy<\/p>\n

While Southern Europe bore the economic brunt of Covid, Finland was hit harder by other crises.<\/p>\n

The war in Ukraine, soaring inflation and persistently high interest rates from the European Central Bank have impacted Finland’s economy. It has been reported that ECB’s rate hikes, designed to curb inflation, proved particularly harsh for Finns, especially homeowners, stalling sectors like construction.<\/p>\n

“Monetary policy isn’t always optimal for Finland,” said P\u00e4ivi Puonti, forecasting director at the Research Institute of the Finnish Economy (ETLA).<\/p>\n

Finland has also seen a steep rise in youth unemployment. In June, 23 percent of Finns under 25 were jobless \u2014 the fourth-highest rate in Europe, behind Estonia, Spain and Sweden. Data for Greece was unavailable.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The change is largely due to declining unemployment in Southern Europe, while Finland’s rate has climbed. Open image…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":39700,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[64,63,99,180],"class_list":{"0":"post-39699","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-jobs","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-business","11":"tag-jobs"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39699","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=39699"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39699\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/39700"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=39699"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=39699"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=39699"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}