Israel

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Unemployment Rate in Israel Hits All-Time Low

Israel’s unemployment rate dropped to 4.5 percent in October, setting a record for the country’s lowest recorded rate, the Central Bureau of Statistics announced Monday.

The drop in the unemployment rate followed a rise to five percent in September.

The number of Israelis working full-time—meaning more than 35 hours a week—rose by nine percent from September to October. Part-time work dropped by 0.3 percent over the same time period.

Israel achieved its previous low in August, when the rate was 4.6 percent. That was then the lowest rate since Israel adopted the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development’s formula for calculating unemployment in 1992.

Israel’s unemployment rate has been low this year in comparison to other developed economies. When the unemployment rate dropped to 4.8 percent in May, Motti Bassok of Haaretz explained that the rate was “not only low historically but low by international standards, and by conventional economic definitions there’s no unemployment at all in Israel.”

[Photo: Moshe Shai / Flash90]