(Reuters) -The number of people registering as jobless in Spain fell slightly in December from a month earlier, ending 2022 at a 15-year low, data from the Labour Ministry showed on Tuesday.
The number of jobless fell by 1.52%, or by 43,727 people, leaving 2.84 million people out of work.
It is the lowest rate since 2007, when 2.2 million were out of work.
“This data shows that labour protection measures are working,” Labour Minister Yolanda Diaz said in a post on Twitter.
Spain lost 8,347 net formal jobs in December to 20.31 million jobs, after November’s record high job creation, a separate report from the Social Security Ministry showed.
Unemployment of young people under 25 decreased 5.86% in December, by 12,185 people, compared with the previous month and reaching a record low of 195,751 people.
“The youngest workers have benefited the most from the approval of the labour reform, signing 1.9 million more contracts than in 2019,” Diaz said.
(Reporting by Joao Manuel Mauricio in Gdansk; additional reporting by Emma Pinedo in Madrid; Editing by David Latona, Robert Birsel)
