German unemployment drops slightly, showing weak autumn recovery

Due to a weak autumn recovery in the job market, the number of unemployed people in Germany decreased only slightly by 66,000 to 2.806 million people in September compared to the previous month.

This is 179,000 more than last year, the Federal Employment Agency announced in the southern city of Nuremberg on Friday.

The unemployment rate decreased by 0.1 points to 6% in September compared to August, it said.

"Unemployment and underemployment have indeed decreased in September, but significantly less than usual for this month," Andrea Nahles, the chairwoman of the Federal Employment Agency, said in Nuremberg.

"Therefore, the start of the autumn recovery in the job market is sluggish this year."

The demand for labour also continued to decline. According to the Federal Employment Agency, there were still 696,000 job vacancies reported for filling in September, 65,000 fewer than a year ago.

Among the federal states, Bremen has the highest unemployment rate at 11.1%, followed by Berlin at 9.8%. Bavaria records the lowest unemployment rate in the state comparison at 3.8%.

The states of Thuringia and Brandenburg are the eastern German states with the lowest rate at 6.1% each.

Short-time work - a government furlough scheme, whereby workers are sent home by a company in financial distress but do not lose their job - might increase slightly again. Between September 1 and 23, notifications for short-time work for 65,000 people were received. This represents a significant increase compared to the previous month.