Unemployment in Poland is counted using two indicators. In the case of the Central Statistical Office (GUS), data on the number of unemployed is obtained from county labor offices. After adding them up, the ratio of people registered in labor offices to the entire economically active population is calculated. Thus, we obtain the registered unemployment rate. In this case it should be taken into account that not all of the unemployed look for work. One should also remember that in Poland in order to maintain access to free health care one has to be registered in a poviat employment office. In turn, the Statistical Office of the European Union – Eurostat measures the unemployment rate in the form of surveys. It calculates the percentage of people aged 15-74 who are unemployed in relation to all economically active people. The unemployed are defined as having actively sought work recently and being able to do so within the next two weeks. Discrepancies between values are due to different data compilation methodologies.
Latest data
According to the latest data from the Central Statistical Office, there were 1,090,400 people unemployed in Poland at the end of January 2021. This represents a registered unemployment rate of 6.5%, which is 0.3% higher than in December 2020 and 1% higher than in January 2020. This is an increase on the whole of 2020 (values ranging from 5.4 to 6.2). However according to Eurostat unemployment is 3.3%. Since 2014 we can observe a successive decrease in the number of people who are unemployed. In addition, since August 2015 this value does not exceed 10% (according to the CSO).
Unemployment in Poland – Comparison with other EU countries
For international comparisons of unemployment values, Eurostat data is used. In 2020, unemployment in the EU increased, and the labor market in Poland is still in better shape than in other countries. According to the latest data, the average in the EU is 7.5%. And only in countries using the euro currency as much as 8.3%. Poland comes out very well in this comparison. We take second place (after the Czech Republic – 2,9%). The worst situation is in Sweden (8.6%), France (8.8%), Italy (8.9%), Lithuania (10.4%) and Spain (16.4%).
