- strategist Jose Luis Martinez at Citi
Spain's sorry tale of constantly deteriorating labour market has worsened in first three months of this year, fuelling a European debate over the effectiveness of the wide-spread austerity measures. The nation's jobless rate shot up to a record 27.2%, up from 26.0% in the previous quarter, with more than 6 million Spaniards being out of work. At the same time, the youth unemployment - people under-25s, and who are not studying, reached 57%. In comparison with 2007, before the global economic crisis hit, Spain had only 1.9 million people unemployed, or 8.6% of the active population. Meantime, there is no immediate prospect of job creation, as the economy shrank 1.9% over the past year. Moreover, it is not expected to return to growth until the end of this year or 2014.
"These figures are worse than expected and highlight the serious situation of the Spanish economy as well as the shocking decoupling between the real and the financial economy," strategist at Citi in Madrid Jose Luis Martinez said.
"More than half Spain's unemployed have very low levels of education and skill levels and that, combined with several years of unemployment, is the biggest risk to recovery in Spain," said Marcel Jansen at Madrid-based think tank Fedea.
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