On average in 2017, 2.6 million people aged 15 to 64 were unemployed as defined by the International Labour Organization (ILO) and 3.4 million were registered as “category A” jobseekers with Pôle emploi in mainland France. Between 2013 and 2017, the gap between these two measurements increased, from 0.3 to 0.8 million. There are two situations that can explain this phenomenon: some jobseekers registered as category A are not unemployed within the meaning of the ILO, while some unemployed persons as defined by the ILO are not registered as category A. By matching individual data from the Labour Force surveys conducted by Insee and Pôle emploi’s Fichier Historique [historical file], it is possible to identify and count these situations.

In 2017, of the 2.7 million people registered as category A who could be matched with the Labour Force survey respondents, 56% were unemployed within the meaning of the ILO, 20% were inactive within the unemployment halo, 16% were inactive outside of the halo and 9% were employed. Conversely, according to the matching carried out, 22% of unemployed people within the meaning of the ILO were not registered with Pôle emploi when the survey was conducted in 2017 and 11% were registered as category B or D. Senior citizens are overrepresented among those registered as category A who are inactive outside the “unemployment halo”, while young people are overrepresented among unemployed people as defined by the ILO who are not registered with Pôle emploi.

Between 2013 and 2017, the number of people registered as category A and inactive within the meaning of the ILO increased by 0.3 million; this increase has made the largest contribution to the widening gap between the number of unemployed people as defined by the ILO and jobseekers registered as category A. In particular, the proportion of senior citizens who were inactive within the meaning of the ILO and registered as category A increased, in a context of the end of job-search exemptions and of the increase in pensionable age. Furthermore, the fall in unemployment among young people, who are frequently not registered with Pôle emploi, also contributed to the widening gap between unemployment as defined by the ILO and the number of people registered as category A.