World Unemployment to Hit Record High in 2013

World unemployment could top record levels this year and continue rising until 2017, the International Labour Organization (ILO) said on Tuesday in its annual employment report. 2009 currently stands as the worst recorded year for world unemployment, with 198 million people across the globe without work.

In its 2013 Global Employment Trends report, the ILO forecasts unemployment numbers will rise by 5.1 million in 2013 to reach 202 million, topping 2009's record. The report also predicts unemployment will rise further in 2014 to reach 205 million.

"Unemployment remains as dire as it was during the crisis in 2009," Ekkehard Ernst, chief of the employment trends unit at the ILO, which wrote the report, told CNBC.

While the crisis may have originated in the developed world, the report noted that 75 percent of 2012's newly unemployed came from outside it, with East Asia, South Asia and Sub-Saharan Africa being the worst affected.

Ernst attributed this to the "spillover effect" of weak growth in advanced economies, and in particular, the recession in Europe.

"The main transmission mechanism of global spillovers has been through international trade, but regions such as Latin America and the Caribbean have also suffered from increased volatility of international capital flows," the report said. Read more >>

Unemployment Has Risen in Two-Thirds of European Countries Since 2010

Unemployment has risen in two-thirds of European countries since 2010 as austerity hit growth and jobs, the International Labor Organization has said. In its annual world of work report, the Geneva-based ILO warned that the weaknesses in the labor market were becoming ingrained, with high levels of long-term and youth unemployment.

The study found there were still 50 million fewer jobs in the global economy than before the recession began in 2008 and it was unlikely that growth would be strong enough in the next two years to find jobs for an extra 80 million people looking for work.

Raymond Torres, director of the International Institute for Labour Studies and author of the report, said: “This is not a normal employment slowdown. Four years into the global crisis, labour market imbalances are becoming more structural, and therefore more difficult to eradicate. Certain groups, such as the long-term unemployed, are at risk of exclusion from the labor market. This means they would be unable to obtain new employment even if there were a strong recovery.” More...