Greek unemployment falls to 7.4% in August, lowest since before the crisis

Stay connected to Greek City Times for Free on Google News
Click NOW

Greece’s seasonally adjusted unemployment rate fell to 7.4 percent in August 2026, the lowest reading reported in the latest labour-force release and 1.4 points below a year earlier, according to the Hellenic Statistical Authority.

Greece’s seasonally adjusted unemployment rate fell to 7.4 percent in August 2026, down from 8.8 percent a year earlier and 7.9 percent in July, the Hellenic Statistical Authority said in its monthly labour-force release on 30 September.

The figure is the lowest monthly rate since May 2008, before the sovereign-debt crisis drove joblessness into the high twenties, according to a widely shared reading of the data. Official comparisons in the ELSTAT bulletin itself are with August 2025 and July 2026.

The number of people in work reached 4,410,105, an increase of 85,042, or 2.0 percent, from August 2025, and of 17,322, or 0.4 percent, from July. The unemployed total stood at 350,800, down 67,181 people, or 16.1 percent, on the year and 25,656, or 6.8 percent, on the month.

People under 75 outside the labour force — neither working nor looking for work — numbered 2,943,171. That was 60,682 fewer than a year earlier, a 2.0 percent decline, though 4,130 more than in July.

A sharper drop among the young, a stubborn gap by sex

The improvement is uneven. Unemployment among men fell to 4.9 percent from 6.9 percent in August 2025. Among women it eased only to 10.3 percent from 11.1 percent, leaving female joblessness more than twice the male rate.

By age, the 15–24 group saw the steepest fall, to 15.6 percent from 21.8 percent a year earlier. For ages 25–74 the rate was 6.9 percent, down from 8.0 percent.

Those splits matter for how the headline is read. A 7.4 percent national rate sits close to levels last seen before the crisis, but youth unemployment remains more than double the adult rate, and the gender gap has narrowed only modestly.

What the series has looked like this year

ELSTAT’s seasonally adjusted path through 2026 has not been a straight line. The published series shows 8.9 percent in January, 9.9 percent in February and a peak of 10.3 percent in March, then 9.0 percent in April, 7.8 percent in May, 8.1 percent in June, 7.9 percent in July and 7.4 percent in August. The August print is the low point of that run.

August is also a month when tourism and seasonal services are near full swing, which is why the authority publishes seasonally adjusted estimates. The adjustment is meant to strip out the regular summer lift so the month can be compared with winter readings. Even on that basis, both employment and unemployment moved in a favourable direction from July.

How far the labour market has come

At the worst of the crisis, Greek unemployment exceeded 27 percent. A return toward the high single digits has been one of the clearer labour-market trends of the past decade, helped by the tourism recovery, EU-funded investment and a long expansion in services employment. The August release adds another data point to that trend: more people in work, fewer counted as unemployed, and a smaller pool outside the labour force than a year ago.

It does not, on its own, describe job quality. ELSTAT’s monthly bulletin does not break out wages, hours, temporary contracts or underemployment. A lower unemployment rate can coincide with part-time or seasonal work, and Greece’s female participation rate has long lagged the male rate, which is one reason the 10.3 percent women’s figure still stands out.

Nor does the release settle the political argument that followed it online. Supporters of the government treated 7.4 percent as evidence that the post-crisis repair of the labour market is intact. Critics tend to answer with wages, housing costs and the remaining gaps by age and sex — issues this particular bulletin does not measure.

READ MORE: Athens Aims to Become the Mediterranean’s Oslo as Shipping Lists on the Exchange.

Stay updated with the latest news from Greece and around the world on greekcitytimes.com.
Contact our newsroom to share your updates, stories, photos, or videos. Follow GCT on Google News and Apple News.