The OECD employment rate – defined as the share of the working-age population with jobs – increased by 0.2 percentage points to 68.2%. Of the 36 OECD countries, 28 saw their employment rate increase.
All age groups benefited from rising employment, but young people (aged 15-24) saw the most pronounced gains with a rise of 0.5 percentage points. Across the OECD, 41.9% of young people are in work.
These gains for younger workers bucked the recent trend, the OECD noted.
“This pattern contrasts with the one that prevailed in the recent past: compared to the previous year, the increase in the OECD employment rate was stronger for older workers than for other age groups,” it said.
‘Prime-age’ workers, those between 25 and 54, saw a 0.2% percentage point increase, taking the employment rate for this age group to 78.3%.
Employment of older workers (aged 55–64) also increased by 0.2%, taking the rate for the group to 61%.
Japan saw the biggest rise in the employment rate (up 0.6 percentage points to 66.9%), while Hungary also recorded a strong gain (up 0.5 percentage points to 69.2%).
The UK and Mexico also outperformed the OECD average with employment rate rises of 0.3 percentage points each. The UK employment rate is now 74.7%, while Mexico’s is 61.4%.
Countries that saw their employment rate fall included Canada (a 0.2 percentage point drop to 73.7%) and Iceland (a 0.4 percentage point drop to 85.2%).
Iceland, however, has by far the highest employment rate among the 36 OECD nations. Turkey, with a rate of 52.5%, has the lowest.
