Overview
- Official INE data for the second quarter show unemployment at 9.87% and 2.495 million people out of work after a fall of about 213,300, while total employment reached roughly 22.78 million.
- The active population rose to a record near 25.27 million and the quarter added about 486,000 jobs, with most new hires on indefinite contracts and a fall in temporalidad to roughly 15% overall.
- Catalunya and Madrid led job creation — Catalunya added about 130,800 jobs and cut its unemployment sharply — while Andalucía, Ceuta and Melilla remain well above the national unemployment rate.
- The recovery is uneven by age: one in five unemployed people is 55 or older and youth unemployment stays high, which advocacy groups say points to barriers for seniors and persistent problems for young workers.
- Analysts warn the Q2 gains reflect normal spring and tourism hiring, that the drop in unemployment was the mildest Q2 fall since 2021, and that structural risks and regional imbalances could limit how durable the improvement is.