August is always a month marked by the end of summer contracts, so there is not usually a good August in terms of employment. It is a premise that has been met once again this year, with 40,428 more unemployed and 189,963 fewer Social Security affiliates. However, in both records, the data presented this Thursday is better than in the months of August of the years prior to the pandemic.
Specifically, last month unemployment increased by 1.4%, to stand at 2,924,420 people, which represents the August with the fewest unemployed since 2008. This increase of 40,248 unemployed is lower than that which occurred in the years 2017- 2019, when the increase was between 46,000 and 54,000. The exception to the rule of bad Augusts occurred last year, when, coinciding with the end of the restrictions due to the pandemic, there was a spectacular reduction in unemployment. However, it is not the usual this month. Since 1996, in the eighth month, unemployment has risen 20 times and has only fallen 6 times.
Unemployment has increased especially in services, followed at a distance by construction and industry. Instead, where it has decreased has been in agriculture. By autonomous communities, it increased in the vast majority, with the largest increases in Andalusia and Catalonia, which account for almost half of the newly unemployed, followed by the Valencian Community, and further away, Madrid.
In recent days, the Second Vice President and Minister of Labor, Yolanda Díaz, had already anticipated this increase. "Except for last year and in few exceptions, unemployment is going to grow in August, in the normal line", affirmed the minister.
With regard to hiring, 40% of the registered contracts have been of an indefinite nature, which is four times more than the percentages prior to the application of the labor reform. There are 506,732 indefinite contracts, of which, percentage-wise, the majority have been registered in construction and agriculture.
Regarding affiliation to Social Security, August has registered 189,963 fewer affiliates, which represents a smaller setback than the average of the months of August of the 2017-19 period, when it was 4% more accentuated, so that the total number of affiliates is clearly above 20 million; specifically, they are 20,151,000.
With regard to seasonally adjusted affiliation, that is, by applying correction criteria for the season and the calendar, there was an increase of 62,135 affiliates. So far this year, the average of this affiliation is similar to that of the 2017-19 period, which are years considered to be dynamic in the labor market.
It is an August that returns to a certain normality after the puncture of the month of July, when it was not expected and instead, unemployment increased by 3,200 people. For the Ministry of Inclusion and Social Security, this setback was caused by three temporary factors: the advancement of hiring to June, the heat wave that could affect commerce, agriculture and construction, and the loss of jobs in education, due to the end of reinforcement contracts due to covid.
