The first quarters are traditionally not good for employment, as they are heavily marked by the end of the Christmas campaign. This year, Catalonia added 84,400 unemployed in absolute terms between January and March, 24% more than the previous quarter, the worst quarter-on-quarter increase since 2009. It is the second autonomous community with the highest increase, only behind the Balearic Islands, where the number of unemployed people soared by 76.55%.According to the active population survey (EPA) published this Tuesday, the Catalan unemployment rate in the first quarter stood at 10.12%. The National Institute of Statistics (INE) estimates that in Catalonia there were 435,600 people who wanted to join the labor market and could not. At the end of last year, however, unemployment stood at 8.24%.If we compare it to the first quarter of 2025, then the number of unemployed in Catalonia increased to a lesser extent – by 15.71% –, but it also grew because the beginning of the year is complicated in terms of employment. Last year Catalonia already experienced the worst start to the year since 2012, adding 47,200 new unemployed people, but this year it has broken new records and surpassed that threshold. The professor of labor law at the University of Barcelona (UB), Jordi Garcia, assured l?ARA that these EPA results show a "change in trend" regarding the dynamism of the labor market observed since 2011. "What is happening is no longer a slowdown in growth, but rather a decrease, a drop," he explained, and he contextualized it within a loss of dynamism in the economy in general.More employment

Despite the increase in the unemployment rate, in Catalonia this first quarter there were 16,900 more workers than in the same period last year, an increase of 0.44%. The explanation is that the volume of the active population – that is, of people who work or want to work – grew more than that of the employed population – people with a paid job –. Therefore, in proportion, those who entered to form part of the unemployed grew more than the group of workers, who represented a smaller percentage of the total.Between January and March, 46,300 jobs were destroyed, causing a 1.18% decrease in employment. In absolute numbers, this means that in Catalonia there were 3.87 million employed people, fewer than the almost four million in the last quarter of last year.Concern among social agents

Social agents have made a negative reading of the data. While Catalan UGT has opined that they show a "worrying evolution" of the Catalan labor market, CCOO de Catalunya has lamented that "they cannot be explained solely by the weight of seasonality". From the employers' associations, Foment has opined that the data are "especially negative" and Pimec has argued that the rise in unemployment "is not explained by a change in economic expectations".For their part, the Minister of Business and Labor, Miquel Sàmper, has committed to studying the data with "diligence". "In the registered unemployment so far, the trend is not this", stated the Secretary of Labor, Paco Ramos. They will analyze "whether trade or the tourism sector has had an impact" or if, on the other hand, the de-seasonalization strategy needs to be "strengthened". In parallel, however, Sàmper has not wanted to fail to highlight that the increase in the active population to record figures is "positive news because it shows that more people want to work in Catalonia", where there is "a dynamic market that works".Unemployment rises by 9.34% across the State

In the State as a whole, the unemployment rate was 10.83%, the lowest level in a first quarter since 2008. The number of employed people broke a new record, exceeding the threshold of 22.5 million people for the first time, after adding 532,300 workers in the last year. In contrast, Spain counted 2.7 million unemployed, 9.34% more than last quarter, but 2.89% less than in the same period last year.In absolute terms, however, between January and March, 170,300 jobs were destroyed in the State compared to the last quarter of last year. In seasonally adjusted terms, the balance was positive, showing a net incorporation of 96,800 people into the labor market, a 0.43% growth in the employment rate. Professor Jordi Garcia has warned that, "whenever someone looks for an excuse, they use the concept of seasonally adjusted", and finds it "difficult to understand that there are very different trends in Catalonia compared to the State". He recalled that Catalonia is a territory "with a lot of economic activity, and that means that if there is a general slowdown, it will probably be felt even more in Catalonia".The year-on-year increase in employment advanced in parallel with the active population, which in the State also reached a new historic high, standing above 25 million people. In the last year, Spain added 447,000 people capable of entering the labor market.

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Employment in Catalonia and Spain continued to grow in the last three months of 2025, reaching record highs. This led to the unemployment rate falling to its lowest level in almost two decades in Spain, below the 10% mark, according to data from the Labor Force Survey (EPA) published this Tuesday by the National Statistics Institute (INE). In Catalonia, however, the unemployment rate rose slightly. Thus, the unemployment rate in Catalonia was 8.24% in the fourth quarter of 2025, six hundredths of a percentage point higher than... the 8.18% recorded in the previous quarterHowever, the increase in the unemployment rate occurred despite a reduction of approximately 900 people in the total number of unemployed workers over the quarter, which stood at 351,200. This is because, proportionally, the number of unemployed decreased at a slower pace than the total number of people (employed or unemployed) active in the labor market, which fell from 4.3 million to 4.26 million between the third and last quarters of last year. As for the total number of employed people—that is, workers with jobs—in Catalonia, this figure fell by approximately 37,400 to 3,913,200.

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This has been the most significant finding in the balance sheet. registered unemployment in Spain during 2025The number of unemployed people under 25 fell in December to 176,852, the lowest figure on record. The overall positive performance of the labor market, especially since the end of the pandemic, has also helped to alleviate one of the labor-related grievances the country has faced since the Great Recession.

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July, August, and September, the three busiest months of the tourist season in our country, closed with a new record for employment in Catalonia, but also with more people losing their jobs. This is indicated by data from the Active Population Survey (EPA) published this Friday by the National Institute of Statistics (INE).

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The labor market continues to expand both in Catalonia and throughout Spain. Employment continued to grow in the second quarter of the year, with Catalonia now approaching four million employed people and reducing the unemployment rate to almost 8%, according to data from the Labor Force Survey (EPA) for the second quarter of this year, published this Thursday by the National Institute of Statistics (INE). Overall, employment in the country exceeds 22 million workers for the first time, while the unemployment rate falls below 11% and for the first time falls below pre-2008 financial crisis levels.

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Catalonia was the autonomous community where unemployment grew the most in the first quarter, with a weak start to the year for the labor market, according to data published this Monday in the Active Population Survey (EPA) prepared by the National Institute of Statistics (INE). Specifically, 47,200 new jobless cases were registered, a quarter-on-quarter increase of 14.3%.

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The data for January, February and March published by the Ministry of Labour already hinted that unemployment in Catalonia would continue its downward trend of the last nine months, albeit with a smaller drop. This Thursday the Labour Force Survey published by the National Institute of Statistics (INE) corroborate it.

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Second consecutive time that the Labour Force Survey (EPA) comes with positive data for the labour market despite the pandemic. The statistics the National Institute of Statistics (INE) has made public this Thursday show that during the second quarter the number of unemployed fell by 21,200 people in Catalonia, to 478,500, and the unemployment rate eased to 12.28%. In fact, it was the second region in Spain with the most important quarterly drop, only behind Murcia (-22,200 unemployed). The comparison with the same period of 2020, however, reveals that pre-pandemic levels have not been fully recovered. Catalonia still has 5,600 unemployed more than in the second quarter of last year, when we were in complete lockdown in order to contain the spread of covid-19. It should also be borne in mind that many people who were then still on furlough have now been laid off.

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After a year of pandemic, there are still about 88,100 more unemployed in Catalonia than in the first quarter of 2020. This was confirmed on Thursday by data from the Labour Force Survey (EPA) published by the INE, which confirms that the last three months unemployment fell by 38,000 people and the rate that observes unemployment fell to 12.9%. The start of 2021, therefore, resulted in the creation of 33,000 new jobs.

]]> Catalonia ended 2020 with a total of 537,900 unemployed people, which amounts to an increase of 31.56% compared to the last quarter of 2019, with 132,100 more unemployed people, which puts the unemployment rate at 13.87%, more than three points above the rate recorded at the end of 2019, 10.45%, according to data from the active population survey (EPA) published on Thursday by the National Statistics Institute (INE). Catalonia is the autonomous community with the highest increase in annual and quarterly unemployment, with 31,300 people out of work more (6.19%).

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