Employment rate at a record high, government claims

Malta’s employment rate is at the highest it’s ever been since such figures started being recorded, the government claimed.

Citing national statistics, the government said that the employment rate between July and September 2014 was at 63.5%, that is 2.1% higher than it had stood in the same period in 2013.

National statistics show that 184,355 people were employed between July and September 2014, an increase of around 6,500 people from the 178,000 that were registered as such in the corresponding period in 2013.

“These results are particularly significant when one considers that the employment increase in the final quarter of the previous administration’s tenure was less than half of what has now been registered,” the government said in a statement. “The previous administration had promised the European Commission that Malta’s employment rate will reach 62.9% by 2020 and we have already over-reached that target.”
The government also said that salaries increased by 2.3% when compared to the previous year, at a time when inflation stood at 0.3%.

“This means that the spending power of the people increased by 2%,” the government claimed. “On the other hand, the average wage had only increased by 1.9% in the final year of the previous administration, at a time when inflation stood at 2.4%.

While the average wage under the previous government had decreased by €80, it has now improved by €315.

The government also said that Malta has the third-lowest unemployment rate in Europe and the fifth-lowest youth unemployment rate.