Rate of unemployment boosts in Armenia

By June 1 this year about 101.200 people are looking for a job in Armenia, according to the official data of the center of employment, among them 91.600 people with a status of unemployed.

Armenian Labour and Social Affairs Ministry told Aysor, the rate of unemployment has increased as compared with the first part of the year.

“At the beginning of the year we had the lowest index ever during the recent years, 6.3%. On January 1, 2008 the index was 6.7%. We managed to decrease the index last year, nevertheless, because of the economic crisis and a number of other factors, the rate of unemployment boosted again and it makes 6.9% as per June 1,” the head of the Armenian Employment State Service Agency Sona Harutyunyan said.

According to her, in the conditions of the increase of the rate of the unemployed, the number of the people, who have found jobs, has also increased. 3481 unemployed have been recruited in June. The index has grown by 5.8% as compared with the same period last year.

S. Harutyunyan explained this phenomenon as follows: “The motivation of the unemployed has got higher, the demands – lower. If previously the unemployed could hesitate because of low salary or poor working conditions, now they don’t, taking into consideration the high rate of unemployment and the standard of living.”