The level of unemployment rose in October to 2.9 percent, according to data released by the Czech Statistics Office. It was up 0.1 percent from September, at least using the CSU’s methodology, which according to Novinky.cz is considerably different from that used by the country’s Office of Labor. CSU figures show that women are far more likely to unemployed than men (3.4 percent women are jobless compared to just 2.5 percent for men). In fact, virtually all of the newly unemployed are currently women, largely because the biggest portion of jobs being cut are client-facing jobs in the services sector. The second lockdown is expected to result in worsening employment levels for all sectors, however. The CSU points out that self-employed people are experiencing far bigger drops in the number of October hours worked (11 percent) than employees (6 percent). The country’s Office of Labor puts the current unemployment rate at 3.7 percent.
