Throughout the third quarter 2020, the labour market across the EU recovered to some extent as COVID-19 measures were relaxed by most Member States.
Between the second and the third quarter of 2020, 2.6 million people in the EU (21.1% of all unemployed in the second quarter of 2020) found a job. During this period, 6.9 million (56.5%) remained unemployed and 2.7 million people (22.4%) became economically inactive.
Of all those initially in employment in the second quarter of 2020, 2.3 million (1.5%) became unemployed in the third quarter of 2020, and 3.7 million (2.4%) transitioned into economic inactivity.
From those initially counted as economically inactive in the second quarter of 2020, a record high number* of 4.1 million people (4.0%) moved into employment in the third quarter of 2020, and similarly a record high number* of 5.1 million (4.9%) transitioned into unemployment.
* since the beginning of the time series in Q2 2010
The graphic and table below give an overview of all possible transitions and show the changes in labour market status. In the graphic, the figures for employment, unemployment and inactivity refer to the number of people remaining in each status between the two quarters. The grey arrows indicate the direction of net flows.
Source dataset: lfsi_long_q (including Member States' data)
Methodological notes:
- Labour market transitions are particularly well placed to describe the developments on the labour market in the COVID-19 crisis situation as they also cover transitions into and out of economic inactivity. Employment and unemployment alone, as defined by the ILO concept, might not be sufficient as active measures to contain employment losses could lead to absences from work rather than dismissals, and individuals could not search for work or were not available due to the containment measures, thus not counting as unemployed.
For more information as well as additional indicators, take a look at the news release on EU labour market in the third quarter 2020.
- These figures are based on seasonally adjusted data. They do not include data for Germany.
For more information:
- Metadata on labour market transitions
- Statistics Explained article on labour market flow statistics in the EU
- Statistics Explained article on Labour market slack - quarterly statistics
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