Much of Europe is reeling from the ongoing economic crisis and harsh austerity measures that have increased unemployment, slashed salaries and severely cut social services. Spain, one of several countries hit by the economic collapse, passed a grim milestone Jan. 27, when its National Statistics Institute reported that more than 5 million people are now unemployed. The number of unemployed workers surged to 5,273,600 in the last quarter of 2011, meaning that 1.6 million Spanish households have no wage earner.
Spain’s unemployment rate is 22.9 percent, the worst in the 17-country Eurozone. By comparison, Ireland has the next highest unemployment rate, 14.6 percent. Job prospects are particularly poor for young people, with a 48.5 percent unemployment rate among those under 25. The youth unemployment numbers have nearly tripled since 2008, now standing at nearly 900,000, and the picture is not expected to improve. Spain’s economy shrank by 0.3 percent in the last quarter, and the Bank of Spain has predicted a 1.5 percent reduction for 2012.
