SLOW DOWN IN EMPLOYMENT AND LABOR FORCE LOSSES
WHILE UNEMPLOYMENT CONTINUES TO INCREASE
Seyfettin Gürsel , Hamza Mutluay
Seasonally adjusted labor market data shows that in the period of May 2020, non-agricultural unemployment rate turned out to be 16.4 percent, with 0.3 percentage point increases compared to April 2020. In this period, non-agricultural employment decreased by 139 thousand while non-agricultural labor force decreased by 77 thousand. According to sectorial data, employment in manufacturing and services sector continued to decrease while agricultural and construction employment increased. Agriculture and construction employment increased by 96 thousand and 107 thousand respectively, manufacturing and services employment decreased by 72 thousand and 174 thousand respectively. Over the last three periods, employment losses in services sector amounted to 1 million 515 thousand. Based on the seasonally adjusted data, while female non-agricultural employment decreased by 15 thousand, non-agricultural female labor force increased by 12 thousand. As the result of this decreases in female employment, non-agricultural female unemployment rate increased by 0.4 percentage points to 18.2 percent. Male labor force and employment decreased by 77 thousand and 131 thousand respectively. Since the decline in male employment was higher than the male labor force, male non-agricultural unemployment rate increased by 0.4 percentage points to 15.5 percent.