Türkiye’s seasonally adjusted unemployment rate fell slightly to 8.5% in October, down 0.1 percentage point from the previous month, the Turkish Statistical Institute (TÜİK) announced on Friday.

The number of unemployed persons aged 15 and over declined by 27,000 to 3.033 million. Despite the overall improvement, the gender gap remained stark: the jobless rate stood at 7.0% for men but 11.3% for women.

Employment continued to grow, with 185,000 new jobs created, pushing the total number of employed persons to 32.772 million. The seasonally adjusted employment rate rose 0.2 percentage points to 49.2%. Men recorded an employment rate of 66.5%, while only 32.4% of women were in work.

Labour force participation also increased, reaching 53.8% (+0.2 pp), driven by a net addition of 157,000 people to the labour force, bringing the total to 35.804 million. Participation was 71.5% for men and 36.5% for women.

Youth unemployment worsened, climbing 0.6 percentage points to 15.6% for the 15–24 age group. The rate was 12.9% for young men and 20.6% for young women.

Average weekly actual working hours, adjusted for seasonal and calendar effects, dropped by 0.7 hours to 42.2 hours in October.

The broader composite measure of labour underutilisation – which includes time-related underemployment, potential labour force, and unemployment – rose by 1.1 percentage points to 29.6%, highlighting persistent slack in the labour market.

Turkish policymakers and economists will be watching whether the modest improvement in headline unemployment can be sustained amid ongoing inflationary pressures and global economic uncertainty. (ILKHA)