Employment up 90,000
The number of people in jobs grew by 89,800 or 4.7% in the year to the end of March this year and now stands at 1,998,100, the Central Statistics Office said today.
This increase compares with an annual rise of 4.6% in the previous quarter and 3.9% in the first quarter of 2005.
There were 88,200 persons unemployed in the first quarter of 2006, representing an increase of 6,100 in the year.
Non-Irish nationals are tentatively estimated to have accounted for almost 50,000 of the annual increase in the numbers in employment and for close to 5,000 of the increase in the numbers unemployed.
When seasonal factors are taken into account the number of people in employment increased by over 25,000 in the quarter while the numbers unemployed showed a slight decrease of 200.
The seasonally-adjusted unemployment rate remained unchanged over the quarter at 4.4%, but showed an increase from the 4.2% recorded in the first quarter of 2005.
