Japan's seasonally adjusted unemployment rate reached a six-year high of 5.4 percent in June, clouding prospects for a real economic recovery anytime soon, as the largest-ever number of people were axed, government data showed Friday.
The rate rose from 5.2 percent in May at a time when industrial production and exports are in a recovery phase. The rate is at its highest level since April 2003, when it hit a record-high 5.5 percent.
The number of jobless people increased by the largest figure ever — 830,000, or 31.3 percent — from a year earlier to 3.48 million for the eighth straight monthly increase, the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications said in a preliminary report.