Words by

Catharine Fulton

Unemployment sat at 4.7% in February, according to a new labour force survey released by Statistics Iceland.
This is a significant decrease from the same month last year when unemployment was at 7,3%. The employment situation has improved more for men than for women, as males have experienced a 3.5% decrease in unemployment in the past year, whereas the unemployment rate of women has decreased by 1.6%. The current unemployment rates by gender are 4.4% for men and 5% for women.
Looking at a smaller time frame, unemployment is dropping month over month, having fallen an entire percentage point from January to February 2013. Over the past six months, ending in February, unemployment has decreased by 8.1%.