Tehran Unemployment Rate at 12.2 Percent

EghtesadOnline: Tehran Province, wherein lies the capital city, registered an unemployment rate of 12.6% in the last fiscal year (March 2018-19).

News ID: ۷۸۴۶۶۱

14 May 2019

The above-mentioned rate is 12.2% for urban areas of the province and 7.2% for rural areas.

“A total of 564,695 people [or 12.2%] were unemployed and 4,048,324 [or 87.8%] were employed in Tehran Province during the last Iranian year [ended March 20, 2019],” Masoud Afshin, the deputy head of Tehran Plan and Budget Organization, was quoted as saying by ILNA.

“Tehran’s working age population, those above 10 years, stood at 11,591,977 of its total population of 13.63 million (85%) in the last Iranian year.”

Tehran’s labor force participation population was 4,613,019 (or 39.8%). The number of people outside the labor force (economically inactive), including homemakers, students and those who had a source of income without having a job in Tehran, stood at 6,978,958 (or 60.2%), Financial Tribune quoted the official as saying.

Nationwide Perspective

According to the Statistical Center of Iran, Iran’s unemployment rate, the proportion of jobless population of ages 10 years and above, stood at 12% in the last Iranian year (March 2018-19), indicating a 0.1% rise compared with the year before (March 2017-18).

A total of 3,260,796 Iranians were unemployed last year.

The unemployment rate for men stood at 10.4% while joblessness among women hovered around 18.9%.

Over 2.25 million men and 1.01 million women of ages 10 and above were jobless last year.

The unemployment rate was 13.5% for urban areas (2.7 million people) and 7.9% for rural areas (553,883 people).

SCI has put last year’s labor force participation rate—the proportion of the population of ages 10 years and above that is economically active either employed or looking for work—at 40.5% or 27.07 million people, which shows a 0.4% rise year-on-year.

Men’s and women’s economic participation rates were 64.8% and 16.1% respectively last year.

According to SCI, 21.71 million men and 5.35 million women of ages 10 and above were economically active last year, that is they were either employed or looking for a job.

SCI provides two figures for the youth unemployment rate: the proportion of those between the ages of 15 and 24 and those between 15 and 29 years.

The youth unemployment rate of those between 15 and 24 years stood at 27.7% last year, posting a 0.5% decrease, while the unemployment rate of those between 15 and 29 years stood at 25.1%, posting no change compared with the previous year.

Underemployment, the condition in which people in a labor force are employed for less than 44 hours of service per week, stood at 10.8% and was higher among men compared to women and among those living in rural areas.

The underemployment rates for men and women stood at 12% and 5.8%, respectively, while the underemployment rate of urban areas was 9.4% and it was 14.6% in rural areas last year.

Some 38.3% of country’s job holders worked 49 hours or more per week, registering a decline of 0.7% YOY.

The share of higher education from the total rate of unemployment was measured at 38.5% last year, which indicates an increase of 1.4% YOY.

The unemployment rate for male and female graduates stood at 26.1% and 65.9% respectively, while it was 41.4% in urban areas and 23.9% in rural areas for those with higher education during the period.

Employment is defined as persons of working age engaged in any activity to produce goods or provide services for pay or profit, whether at work during the reference period or not at work due to a temporary absence, or having working-time arrangement.

The total employment rate of last year was 35.6% (23.81 million). The employment rates for men and women were 58.1% and 13%, respectively, involving 19.46 million men and 4.34 million women. The employment rate was 34.4% or 17.38 million in urban areas and 39.2% or 6.43 million in rural areas.

Academic, Sectoral, Provincial Configuration

The employment rate among university graduates stood at 23.9% of the total employed population and male and female graduate employment was 20.4% and 39.2%, respectively. Graduate employment rates in urban and rural areas stood at 30% and 7.2% of the total population of job-holders.

The services sector employed 50.3% of the Iranian working population (11.96 million), 0.1% more than the year before, whereas industrial and agricultural sectors provided 32% and 17.7% of the working population with jobs respectively.

Over 7.62 million were employed in the industrial sector, indicating a decrease of 0.3% compared with the year before and 4.21 million worked in the agriculture sector, posting a 0.2% growth YOY.

The services sector employed 9.64 million men and 2.31 million women last year, 6.45 million men and 1.16 million women were working in the industrial sector and 3.35 million men and 856,102 women were active in the agriculture sector last year.

Services sector accounted for 59.9% or 10.4 million of all urban jobs and 24.3% or 1.56 million of all rural jobs. The industrial sector made up 34% or 5.9 million of the jobs in urban areas and 26.6% or 1.71 million of the employment in rural areas, whereas 6.1% or 1.05 million of the total jobs in urban areas and 49.1% or 3.15 million of the jobs in rural areas were in the agriculture sector.

Semnan Province had the lowest unemployment rate of 7.2% among all Iranian provinces last year while Kermanshah province had the highest unemployment rate of 18.7%.

Nine provinces, namely Semnan (7.2%), Hamedan (8.3%), Markazi (8.4%), Zanjan (8.5%), South Khorasan (8.5%), Mazandaran (8.5%), Fars (8.9%), Ardabil (9.3%) and Golestan (9.8%) registered single-digit unemployment rates last year.

Khorasan Razavi had the highest labor force participation rate (44.9%) and Sistan-Baluchestan had the lowest labor force participation rate (33.9%), whereas Tehran registered a 39.8% participation rate last year.

North Khorasan and Ardabil registered the highest employment rate of 40.2% while Sistan-Baluchestan filed the lowest employment rate of 28.5% among all Iranian provinces.