One-third of unemployed individuals in Belgium found a job between 2023 and 2024, the Belgian statistics office, Statbel, reported on Tuesday.
Nearly 120,000 job seekers from 2023, or 40% of the unemployed, were still looking for work in 2024, while 28% became inactive.
The employment rate remained almost unchanged compared to the previous year. Of the 5 million employed people aged 15 to 64 in 2023, about 4.7 million were still working in 2024, 82,000 became unemployed, and 195,000 became inactive.
Not all those who remained employed kept the same job. Approximately 7.5% changed jobs by either accepting a new position within the same company, joining a new company, or starting their own business. This is similar to the previous year, but lower than the pre-pandemic levels of 5 to 6%.
Job mobility is higher among young people in Brussels and Flanders. It is also higher among those with a high level of education and part-time workers. Although the job-change numbers remained stable, the percentage of workers staying in the same sector decreased from 52.6 to 49.6.
Lastly, 85.8% of inactive individuals aged 15 to 64 remained inactive in 2024. Another 9.6% started working, and 4.6% became unemployed.
Of the 2.2 million inactive persons in 2023, 1.9 million remained inactive in 2024, including a significant number of students who reported not working.
