Alarming rates

A recent report by the Department of Statistics shows that unemployment among women increased significantly in the first quarter of this year, reaching 33 per cent this year, compared with 24.8 per cent in the first quarter of 2016.

Unemployment in the country has also risen from 15.8 per cent during the same period last year to 18.2 per cent in 2017.

Many factors are to blame for this unusually high unemployment rate, including regional turmoil, the drop in exports, economic slowdown, and the influx of Syrian refugees into the Kingdom, with many entering the informal sector of the economy and competing for jobs in the formal sector.

The biggest setback is the fact that women are bearing the brunt of unemployment in the country despite Jordan’s National Employment Strategy for 2011-2020, which calls for bridging the gender gap in employment related issues.

This is happening despite the academic excellence of female students in secondary school and at university, and emerging societal norms that encourage women to seek employment in order to make ends meet for their families.

Pundits offer all sorts of explanations — or rather, excuses — for this growing gender gap in employment, but surely, conditions in the country have not changed so much between 2016 and this year to explain the growing gender gap.

It must be the slowdown of the economy at least on the micro level if not on the macro level that is contributing to a rise in unemployment in general and in turn among women.

The solution, therefore, lies in improving the rate of economic development.

Regional instability is not going away anytime soon, and Jordan cannot afford to wait until calm returns to the Middle East to stimulate its economy.

Something has to be done, now, to uplift the national economy. 

Otherwise, the country risks an alarming increase in the number of unemployed, disgruntled young men and women who could easily fall prey to crime, drugs and extremism.