Press release No. 139 of 31 March 2022
Persons in employment resident in Germany, February 2022
+0.1% on the previous month (seasonally adjusted)
+0.1% on the previous month (not seasonally adjusted)
+1.5% on the same month a year earlier
WIESBADEN – Roughly 45.0 million people resident in Germany (national concept) were in employment in February 2022 according to provisional calculations of the Federal Statistical Office (Destatis). Compared with the previous month, the seasonally adjusted number of persons in employment rose by 28,000 (+0.1%) in February 2022, following an average monthly increase of 58,000 people, or 0.1%, in the period from March 2021 to January 2022. The number of persons in employment is still below the pre-crisis level. On a seasonally adjusted basis, however, the number of persons in employment in February 2022 was down by just 0.2%, or -72,000 people, on February 2020, the month before the Covid-19 crisis began in Germany.
Without seasonal adjustment, the number of persons in employment in February 2022 rose by 38,000 (also +0.1%) on January 2022. The increase was less pronounced than compared with the February average of the three pre-crisis years from 2017 to 2019 (+63,000 people).
Please note that short-time workers are counted as persons in employment in accordance with the employment accounts and labour force survey concepts.
Largest year-on-year increase in employment since January 2018
Compared with February 2021, the number of persons in employment was up by 1.5%, or +668,000 people, in February 2022. This was the tenth consecutive month since May 2021 for which a larger year-on-year increase was recorded. In February 2021, however, the year-on-year change rate had been -1.6%.
Until May 2021, this calculated positive year-on-year development was mainly due to the sharp fall in the number of persons in employment in the spring of 2020, when the measures taken to contain the Covid-19 pandemic started to have a strong impact on the labour market. A marked upward trend has become evident since the summer of 2021, which goes beyond this base effect and continued in February 2022. The last time employment showed such a year-on-year increase was in January 2018.
Adjusted unemployment rate unchanged at 3.1% in February 2022
According to calculations based on the labour force survey, 1.29 million people were unemployed in February 2022. That was a decline of 512,000 (-28.5%) compared with February 2021. The unemployment rate was 3.0% (February 2021: 4.2%).
Adjusted for seasonal and irregular effects due, for instance, to weather conditions or strike, the number of unemployed stood at 1.34 million, which was a minor decline on January 2022 (-20,400 people; -1.5%). The adjusted unemployment rate stood unchanged at 3.1% in February 2022.
Methodological note:
The differing comparative periods must be taken into account in all press releases on short-term indicators. Short-term economic monitoring focuses on comparisons with the previous month or previous quarter. These reflect short-term economic trends. In contrast, a comparison with the previous year is intended to offer a long-term comparison of levels and is hardly subject to seasonal fluctuations. Due to temporarily strong decreases during the Covid-19 crisis, the year-on-year comparison is not always suited for assessing the current development (base effect). To permit a direct relation to the pre-crisis level to be established, figures are compared with February 2020 where this is helpful to assess the current level.
The number of persons in employment from the employment accounts differs from that of the labour force survey. The differences are mainly due to the different conceptual approaches (national or domestic concept) used in the two statistical systems. For more information on the reasons why the results of the labour force survey differ from those of the employment accounts please refer to the explanatory notes on the statistics.
Persons in employment and unemployed persons are counted according to the employment status concept of the International Labour Organization (ILO). Therefore, unemployment as shown here must not be confused with registered unemployment as published by the Federal Employment Agency in accordance with the German Social Code. In the European Statistical System, the results of the labour force survey are used as a standard basis for calculating unemployment rates.
The microcensus and the integrated labour force survey were redesigned both in technical and in methodological terms; the new approach was introduced at the beginning of 2020. More information is available here.
Furthermore a new European legal basis has been in force for the labour force survey since January 2021. On this basis, the results were revised back to January 2020. Due to the changes, the results from reference year 2020 are comparable with those compiled until 2019 only to a limited extent. The first results available from the 2021 microcensus were integrated in the calculation of the results for February 2022 and the monthly figures were revised accordingly. Within the system of the redesigned survey, the results at the current end of the series should be regarded as provisional.
| Year | Month | Original values | Seasonally adjusted 2 | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| persons | change on previous month | change on the same month of the previous year | persons | change on previous month | ||
| millions | % | millions | % | |||
| 1 Results of employment accounts as part of national accounting: persons in employment whose place of residence is in Germany (national concept). The respective time series for persons in employment whose place of work is in Germany (domestic concept) are presented here. 2 Seasonal adjustment by X13-ARIMA method using JDemetra+. | ||||||
| 2019 | January | 44.761 | -0.7 | 1.1 | 44.985 | 0.1 |
| February | 44.825 | 0.1 | 1.2 | 45.030 | 0.1 | |
| March | 44.903 | 0.2 | 1.1 | 45.079 | 0.1 | |
| April | 45.039 | 0.3 | 1.1 | 45.128 | 0.1 | |
| May | 45.103 | 0.1 | 1.0 | 45.137 | 0.0 | |
| June | 45.088 | 0.0 | 0.9 | 45.129 | 0.0 | |
| July | 45.094 | 0.0 | 0.9 | 45.150 | 0.0 | |
| August | 45.082 | 0.0 | 0.7 | 45.137 | 0.0 | |
| September | 45.331 | 0.6 | 0.8 | 45.148 | 0.0 | |
| October | 45.427 | 0.2 | 0.8 | 45.169 | 0.0 | |
| November | 45.496 | 0.2 | 0.7 | 45.201 | 0.1 | |
| December | 45.358 | -0.3 | 0.7 | 45.217 | 0.0 | |
| 2020 | January | 45.049 | -0.7 | 0.6 | 45.257 | 0.1 |
| February | 45.091 | 0.1 | 0.6 | 45.286 | 0.1 | |
| March | 44.998 | -0.2 | 0.2 | 45.174 | -0.2 | |
| April | 44.729 | -0.6 | -0.7 | 44.823 | -0.8 | |
| May | 44.572 | -0.4 | -1.2 | 44.621 | -0.5 | |
| June | 44.567 | 0.0 | -1.2 | 44.618 | 0.0 | |
| July | 44.557 | 0.0 | -1.2 | 44.618 | 0.0 | |
| August | 44.587 | 0.1 | -1.1 | 44.646 | 0.1 | |
| September | 44.849 | 0.6 | -1.1 | 44.667 | 0.0 | |
| October | 44.942 | 0.2 | -1.1 | 44.681 | 0.0 | |
| November | 44.923 | 0.0 | -1.3 | 44.631 | -0.1 | |
| December | 44.773 | -0.3 | -1.3 | 44.628 | 0.0 | |
2021 | January | 44.369 | -0.9 | -1.5 | 44.562 | -0.1 |
| February | 44.363 | 0.0 | -1.6 | 44.544 | 0.0 | |
| March | 44.438 | 0.2 | -1.2 | 44.613 | 0.2 | |
| April | 44.531 | 0.2 | -0.4 | 44.631 | 0.0 | |
| May | 44.607 | 0.2 | 0.1 | 44.665 | 0.1 | |
| June | 44.721 | 0.3 | 0.3 | 44.778 | 0.3 | |
| July | 44.777 | 0.1 | 0.5 | 44.842 | 0.1 | |
| August | 44.837 | 0.1 | 0.6 | 44.899 | 0.1 | |
| September | 45.133 | 0.7 | 0.6 | 44.946 | 0.1 | |
| October | 45.265 | 0.3 | 0.7 | 44.995 | 0.1 | |
| November | 45.349 | 0.2 | 0.9 | 45.052 | 0.1 | |
| December | 45.256 | -0.2 | 1.1 | 45.105 | 0.1 | |
| 2022 | January | 44.993 | -0.6 | 1.4 | 45.186 | 0.2 |
| February | 45.031 | 0.1 | 1.5 | 45.214 | 0.1 | |
| February 2022 3 | Previous month | Same month of the previous year | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| January 2022 4 | Change | February 2021 5 | Change | ||
| 1 Persons in households aged 15 to 74 years. 2 There may be rounding discrepancies as results are shown in rounded form. 3 Results based on the labour force survey, provisional. 4 Results based on the labour force survey, revised and provisional. 5 Results based on the labour force survey, revised. 6 Unemployed persons as a percentage of the labour force (persons in employment and unemployed) aged 15 to 74 years. 7 Persons in employment as a percentage of all persons aged 15 to 74 years. 8 Trend cycle component (X-13-ARIMA method using JDemetra+; calculation by Eurostat). | |||||
| Original values | |||||
| millions | % | millions | % | ||
| Unemployed persons | 1.29 | 1.43 | -10.1 | 1.80 | -28.5 |
| Persons in employment | 42.00 | 42.08 | -0.2 | 40.61 | 3.4 |
| percentage shares | % | percentage shares | % | ||
| Unemployment rate 6 | 3.0 | 3.3 | -9.7 | 4.2 | -29.9 |
| Employment rate 7 | 67.8 | 67.9 | -0.2 | 65.4 | 3.7 |
| Adjusted results 8 | |||||
| millions | % | millions | % | ||
| Unemployed persons | 1.34 | 1.36 | -1.5 | 1.68 | -20.0 |
| Persons in employment | 42.11 | 42.00 | 0.3 | 41.09 | 2.5 |
| percentage shares | percentage points | percentage shares | percentage points | ||
| Unemployment rate 6 | 3.1 | 3.1 | -0.1 | 3.9 | -0.8 |
| Men | 3.4 | 3.5 | -0.1 | 4.3 | -0.9 |
| Women | 2.8 | 2.8 | 0.0 | 3.5 | -0.8 |
| Persons aged under 25 years | 5.7 | 5.8 | -0.1 | 7.8 | -2.1 |
| Persons aged 25 to 74 years | 2.8 | 2.8 | -0.1 | 3.5 | -0.7 |
| Employment rate 7 | 68.0 | 67.8 | 0.2 | 66.2 | 1.8 |
Crisis Monitor enables comparison between coronavirus crisis and financial and economic crisis
The employment figures also form part of the Crisis Monitor (www.destatis.de/krisenmonitor), by means of which the Federal Statistical Office compares the development of major short-term indicators in the coronavirus crisis and in the financial and economic crisis of 2008/2009. The Crisis monitor complements the Corona statistics webpage (www.destatis.de/corona), which provides statistical information on the economic and social consequences of the coronavirus pandemic.
More information:
Detailed data and long time series are available from the GENESIS-Online database. Data on persons in employment from the employment accounts are available in tables 13321-0001 (months), 13321-0002 (quarters) and 81000-0011 (years). Data on persons in employment and unemployed persons from the labour force survey can be found in tables 13231-0001 to 13231-0003 (months).
