About 24.8 percent of working-age Jordanians were unemployed in the second quarter of 2021, according to official figures released Tuesday.
Despite a marginal drop of 0.2 percent from the figure reported in the first quarter of the year, the unemployment rate remains 1.9 percent higher than the figure reported in the same period of 2020, the Department of Statistics (DoS) said in a quarterly statistical report.
Unemployment among males in the reporting period stood at 22.7 percent against 33.1 percent for females, rising by 1.2 and 4.5 percent, respectively, compared with the same period in 2020. But when compared with the January-March figures of this year, the data indicate that male unemployment edged down by 1.5 percent while the number of unemployed females rose by 4.6 percent.
Also, unemployment surged among university degree holders (calculated by dividing the number of unemployed individuals holding a bachelor’s degree and higher by the number of unemployed persons holding the same qualification), reaching 31.1 percent compared to other educational levels.
The figures indicated that 56.7 percent of the total unemployed were holders of secondary school certificates or higher, and that 43.3 percent of the total unemployed had educational qualifications below high school.
At the governorate level, the highest unemployment rate was recorded in Al-Balqa Governorate, at 28.2 percent, while the lowest unemployment rate was in Karak Governorate, at 15.7 percent.
Source: Jordan News Agency