The General Authority for Statistics reported there are over 5 million employed Saudis in the workforce for the second quarter of the year 2016. A source said the rate of unemployment for Saudis over 15 years old is at 11.6 percent, a 0.1 percent increase in comparison to the rate in the second half of year 2015 which was at 11.5 percent. "The rate of unemployment for the entire population of Saudis and non-Saudis over 15 years old in the Kingdom is 5.6 percent. 65 percent of the workforce is aged 20 to 39 years old and 36 of them have a Bachelor's degree or an equivalent diploma," said the source. The source said unemployed individuals are a total of 657,936, 35.9 percent of them are men and 64.1 percent of them are women. "About 39 percent of Saudis who are unemployed are aged 25 to 29 years old. Also 54 percent of the unemployed have a Bachelor's degree," said the source. The source said the General Authority for Statistics has published its reports on its website www.stats.gov.sa. "The report uses the term "workforce" to mean all individuals over 15 years old who are either employed or unemployed. The employed members of the work force are those who were working for at least an hour and were being paid for their work during the week of collecting data for the report," said the source. The source also said the employed members of the work force also includes the individuals who were absent from work for sickness, holiday or any other reason.
