THE SUN MANIPULATES UNEMPLOYMENT FIGURES TO TRY AND MAKE THE EU LOOK BAD

Eurostat has published its latest unemployment figures for the EU and the Eurozone, and The Sun has cherry-picked and distorted the data to try and make an anti-EU point.

The July 2016 statistics, available here, show that unemployment and youth unemployment is gradually falling overall. It is also falling within the majority of individual EU countries, rising in only three countries (Estonia, Austria and Belgium).

Yet there is no mention of this in The Sun report on the findings. In an article titled ‘EU ISN’T WORKING’, the tabloid – which encouraged its readers to vote for Brexit in the EU referendum vote – has singled out countries with the highest unemployment and youth unemployment rates, contrasting them with UK figures to try and imply that the EU is to blame.

This is despite the fact that the biggest economy in the EU – Germany – has one of the lowest unemployment (4.2%) and youth unemployment (7.2%) rates. No mention of this in the report either.

Much of the article focuses on youth unemployment, particularly of that in the Eurozone where it has been highest. The article sub-heading states that ‘shocking stats show a fifth of youths in the Eurozone are jobless’  while the article claims that youth unemployment has ‘shot up’.

But although the youth unemployment figures in the Eurozone are admittedly high, currently at 21.1% overall, they have fallen from 22.1% this time last year and from a high of 24.4% in 2013.

This is because unemployment figures in most developed countries have been greatly affected by the global economic crisis that started in 2008. They are not determined by EU membership. Before the crisis, youth unemployment in the EU was at a low of 15.1%.

Distortion, selective reporting, absence of context… you’d almost believe that the paper has an agenda to push…

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