FX.co ★ Latvia Unemployment Rate at 1-Year High

Latvia’s unemployment rate rose to 7.1% in the first quarter of 2026, up from 6.7% in the previous quarter but down from 7.4% a year earlier. This was the highest level since the first quarter of 2025, as the number of unemployed increased by 2.6 thousand quarter-on-quarter to 66.4 thousand. The jobless rate for men declined from 7.6% to 7.2%, with 32.9 thousand men unemployed, while the rate for women climbed from 5.9% to 7.0%, with 33.4 thousand women unemployed. Meanwhile, total employment fell by 11.6 thousand to 871.2 thousand, bringing the employment rate down by 1 percentage point from the fourth quarter to 63.8%. Youth unemployment (ages 15–24) decreased to 9.4%, or 6.2 thousand people, 4.1 percentage points lower than in Q4. At the same time, 16.6% of the population aged 20–64—equivalent to 173.6 thousand people—remained economically inactive, a decrease of 5.6 thousand compared with the same period a year earlier.