By Joshua Kirby
Spain's jobs market ended the year largely stable, with unemployment ticking down slightly.
The jobless rate fell to 11.76% from 11.84% in the third quarter, data from national statistics agency INE showed Friday. This was in contrast to economists' expectations for a slight increase to 11.9%, according to a poll compiled by FactSet.
Tourism was a major boost for Spanish workers over the summer, but with the end of the season the sector's share of the overall labor force has fallen slightly, making up around 12.5% of the workforce at the end of the year, according to tourism ministry data set out last week. The services sector as a whole lost more than 100,000 jobs in the fourth quarter, while jobs were added in agriculture, construction and industry.
For the year as a whole, the country added some 783,000 jobs, driven by a surge in permanent contracts.
The fall in Spanish joblessness comes amid a similarly tight jobs market across the wider eurozone, a phenomenon that has led to fears of continued wage growth keeping price inflation stickier for longer.
Write to Joshua Kirby at joshua.kirby@wsj.com; @joshualeokirby
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
01-26-24 0316ET
