Chile Unemployment Rate Climbs to 9.5%, a Five-Year High
Chile's jobless rate reached 9.5% in the May to July moving quarter. That is its highest since July 2021, the National Statistics Institute said. The post Chile Unemployment Rate Climbs to 9.5%, a Five-Year High appeared first on The Rio Times .
Chile's unemployment rate climbed to 9.5%, marking a five-year high in the period from May to July 2026, according to the National Statistics Institute. This level is 0.8 percentage points higher than the same quarter a year prior. The National Employment Survey, covering the rolling three-month window of May, June and July, revealed that 981,044 individuals were counted as unemployed, marking a 10.4% rise annually.
Simultaneously, the number of people in work fell to 9,314,017, a decline of 16,292 compared to the previous year. Eight of Chile's sixteen regions reported unemployment rates at or above 10%, with Ñuble leading at 11.0%, while Aysén recorded the lowest at 4.0%. The rise in unemployment has two drivers: a growing labor force and a shrinking number of employed people.
First-time job seekers rose by 20.9% year-on-year, while those who lost their previous jobs rose by 9.4%. Informal employment reached 26.5% of all jobs, up 0.5 percentage points from the previous year. Female unemployment stood at 10.3%, up 0.6 percentage points, while male unemployment rose faster, increasing by 1.0 point to 8.9%.
The government has announced 25,000 hiring subsidies to be opened the following week through the subsidioalempleo.cl website. These subsidies are worth about half the monthly minimum wage, near CLP 276,000 (US$298). President José Antonio Kast has set a target of a 6.5% unemployment rate by the end of his term and expects hiring to improve in the final quarter of 2026, with construction being the sector he expects to lead a recovery.
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