There was a fall of 25,000 in the number of people employed in Ireland in the twelve months to August this year, according to the latest Quarterly National Household Survey from the Central Statistics Office.
This is the first annual fall in employment recorded by the CSO since 1991.
The survey showed that there were 2,120,800 people in employment in the quarter, down 1.2% on the same period last year.
The figures also show that unemployment increased by 60% during the same period.
It is the first time for 25 years that this combination of a sharp fall in employment and a sharp rise in unemployment has been recorded in official figures.
The picture of the Irish labour market presented in this latest quarterly national household survey is far from pretty.
In fact, when the numbers for employment are combined with those for unemployment it is the worst situation we have had to deal with since 1983.
Men are doing particularly poorly with the number of men with jobs down by 32,000 over the year. Women have fared better with a gain of 7,000 in employment during the year.
The collapse in construction has been one of the big drivers behind the poor figures with the numbers engaged in house building down by 40,000 compared with this time last year. Other areas of construction expanded a little and provided some cushion for builders, with gain of 14,000 jobs on infrastructure and commercial building projects.
The trends, however, look poor. Employment in manufacturing is down 9,400, while the contraction in the leisure industry has knocked another 5,400 people out of jobs in hotels and restaurants over the twelve month period.
Non-Irish nationals have held their own with the overall employment of non-nationals unchanged from last year. However, the flow of non-nationals into the country has slowed to just one-sixth of the level of last year.
The figures also show that the overall number of people who can be described as fully unemployed rose by 50% to 160,000 in the twelve months to August this year.
FÁS, the State training and employment authority, has warned that the number of people employed in Ireland could fall by more than 100,000, or 5%, next year. This would be four times more than the annual fall in employment registered in the Quarterly National Household survey today.
FÁS economist Brian McCormick said that the credit crunch now is beginning to hit employment in the financial sector, while the slowdown in consumer spending has adversely affected job prospects in the retail sector. FÁS also said that the rate of unemployment could exceed 8.5% next year.
