Page 59 - U4SSC KPIs Verification Manual - A guide for verifiers

Dimension Economy
Sub-Dimension Productivity

Category Employment
KPI Name Unemployment Rate
KPI No. EC: P: EM: 1C Type: Core Type: Structural

Definition / Percentage of the total city labour force that is unemployed
Description

Rationale / Unemployment is a measure of economic health. Rising unemployment signals
Interpretation / a weak economy with slow growth and low spending. Central banks often set
Benchmarking national targets. For instance, the target of a 5–7 per cent unemployment rate
in North America would be unacceptable in Japan, where 3 per cent is the
norm; and would be unrealistically optimistic for Greece which has a 23 per cent
unemployment rate.
The term “unemployed” includes all persons of working age who are:

a) without work during the reference period, i.e., not paid employment or
self-employment;
b) currently available for work, i.e., were available for paid employment or self-
employment during the reference period; and
c) seeking work, i.e., specific steps were taken in a specified recent period to seek
paid employment or self-employment.
For purposes of international comparability, the period of job search is often
defined as the preceding four weeks.
A declining trend and lower values are considered positive.
Source(s) NOTE – ILO. Guidelines for producers and users of statistical and legal framework
indicators. Retrieved from <http:// www .ilo .org/ wcmsp5/ groups/ public/ - -
-dgreports/ - - -integration/ documents/ publication/ wcms _229374 .pdf>

Methodology Calculate as:
Numerator: Total number of the city labour force that is unemployed.
Denominator: Total number of the city labour force.
Multiply by 100.
As an alternative, and where available, government statistics can be reported
directly instead of calculating the indicator value.
Dimension Economy

Unit Percentage

U4SSC KPIs Verification Manual-A guide for verifiers 49