Brazil registers 14.1 million unemployed from August to October

The unemployment rate in Brazil was 14.3 percent in the August-October quarter, which is equivalent to 14.1 million people without work, the Brazilian Institute of Geography and Statistics reported today (IBGE).

The data, part of the IBGE National Household Samples Survey, indicate that compared to the previous quarter (May to July), there was an increase of 0.5 percentage points (13.8 percent).

Compared to the same stage of 2019, it is 2.7 units higher (11.6 percent).

In addition to the increase in the number of job seekers, there was a 2.8 percent rise in the employed population, which reached 84.3 million people.

According to Adriana Beringuy, research analyst at the institute, 'this quarter we have seen a reduction in the population outside the employed force and this may have been reflected in the increase of people absorbed by the labor market and also in the growth of demand for labor '.

On the other hand, the number of employees without a job portfolio in the private sector grew by nine percent compared to the previous quarter and reached 9.5 million.

Of this expansion of the employed population of 2.3 million people, 89 percent are informal workers.

The informality rate reached 38.8 percent of the employed population, which is equivalent to 32.7 million.

The contingent of discouraged people - who did not look for work, but who wanted to get it and were available - was estimated at 5.8 million, remaining stable compared to the last quarter.

The Covid-19 pandemic, which has claimed more than 191 thousand deaths in the South American giant so far, and the partial confinement measures to stop its expansion affected the economy that will register a 4.5 percent recession, according to government predictions.