Unemployment drops to 12.6% in the quarter to September; 13.5 million are looking for a vacancy

The unemployment rate dropped to 12.6% in the July-September 2021 moving quarter, down 1.6 percentage points from the April-June 2021 quarter (14.2%), according to data from the National Survey by Continuous Household Sample (PNAD), released this Tuesday (30) by the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics (IBGE).

In comparison with the same moving quarter of the previous year, July to September 2020, when the rate was estimated at 14.9%, the drop was 2.2 points.

Even with the 9.3% decline in the number of people interested in a job opening, the volume is still high, reaching 13.5 million people.

The number of employed persons, on the other hand, registered an increase of 4% in the period, reaching 93 million people.

The rate came in a little better than market expectations, which pointed to 12.7%.

From one moving quarter to another, the informality rate dropped from 41.1% to 40.6%. Brazil still has 38 million informal workers.

If, on the one hand, occupation grew by almost 10%, the mass of income remained stable – that is, there are more people working, but wages have not increased.

The average worker’s income fell 4% in the same comparison, which indicates that the recovery of the labor market after the most critical period of the pandemic is supported by informal, more precarious jobs.

It is noteworthy that informality accounts for 54% of the growth in occupation in the period, according to the IBGE.

However, this scenario is natural, according to economists interviewed by CNN economics analyst Priscila Yazbeck, as the activity is still recovering from a shock.

Advancement of domestic and unregistered workers

Among the employment categories that grew the most compared to the previous quarter are employees in the private sector without a formal contract (10.2%), which added up to 11.7 million people.

In the same period, the number of domestic workers reached 5.4 million, an increase of 9.2%, the highest since the beginning of the historical series of the survey, in 2012.

If only unregistered workers are considered, there was an increase of 10.8%, which represents 396 thousand more people, highlights the institute.

“It’s a recovery process that had already been taking place from June onwards. The category of domestic workers was the most affected in the occupation last year and, in recent months, there has been an important expansion”, explains the coordinator of work and income at the IBGE, Adriana Beringuy.

“Although there is this recovery in the last quarters of the survey, the current contingent of these workers is lower than the pre-pandemic period”, he says. The institute adds that, in the first quarter of last year, 6 million people were domestic workers.

It is also worth mentioning the growth in the group of self-employed workers (3.3%), totaling 25.5 million people in this category, the highest number since the beginning of the historical series of the survey.

This contingent includes workers who do not have CNPJ, which grew 1.9% compared to the last quarter. With that, the informality rate reached 40.6% of the population. There are 38 million workers in this situation.

“The increase in occupation is also mainly related to commerce (7.5%), with 1.2 million more workers, industry (6.3%, or 721 thousand people), construction (7.3%, or 486 thousand people) and domestic services (8.9%, with the addition of 444 thousand people)”, says the IBGE.

Fall in unemployment is seen in all regions

The survey shows that the drop in the unemployment rate was widespread across all regions.

In the Southeast, a region that maintains

With the largest number of unemployed people (6.3 million), the Southeast registered a rate of 13.1% in the quarter through September, compared to 14.6% from April to June.

In the Northeast, the rate dropped from 18.3 to 16.4% in the same comparison. This region continues to have the highest unemployment rate in the country.

With the highest unemployment rate in the country (18.7%), Bahia presented stability in this sense.