Unemployment in Costa Rica, which reached historic levels at the most critical moments of the COVID-19 Pandemic, is showing a downward trend this beginning of the year, according to the Continuous Employment Survey (ECE).
In the moving quarter September-October-November 2020, the unemployment rate in Costa Rica stood at 21.3 percent, and confirmed the recovery of 183 thousand 274 jobs from the most critical moment of the Pandemic at the labor level, between May and July of the previous year.
Thus, between September and November, one million 906 thousand 286 people had work, 28 thousand 458 people more than in the previous moving quarter, while the employment rate was 60.3 percent for men and 34.7 percent among women.
However, unemployed people in that moving quarter amounted to 516,542, while underemployment (those who work less than 40 hours per week and want to work more) was 22.7 percent.
Positive recovery trend
Despite the strong impact of COVID-19 on employment in this country, with its serious social and economic consequences, the Government highlights that the trend of decreasing unemployment has been maintained for the fourth consecutive time since the highest data for impact in the moving quarter of May-June-July. In that period of 2019, Costa Rica presented an unemployment rate of 24.4 percent, the highest in its history.
Commenting on the ECE data, the Minister of Labor and Social Security Silvia Lara highlighted the importance of seeing a recovery trend in the labor market, based on the gradual opening of the economy last August.
“This, although positive, poses a very important challenge for the country in this recovery process and it is to move towards a transformation of the labor market that allows us to meet the human capital needs that are occurring in the country,” Lara pointed out.
