The line graph illustrates the proportion of unemployment in Germany, Greece, Iceland, United Kingdom and Spain between 2005 and 2010. Overall, it is readily apparent that the unemployment rate in Germany started with the highest and experienced a downward trend in the period of 5 years. By contrast, the four other countries saw an increasing percentage of unemployment, with the figure for Spain ending the period with the highest rate.
In 2005, Germany had the highest employment rate at approximately 11%, followed closely by Greece and Spain at 10%, 9% respectively. In the same year, the figures for Ireland and the United Kingdom were relatively the same at around 5%. Over the next 3 years, Germany’s unemployment gradually declined, reaching about 5% by 2008, similar to it the employment rate of Greece slightly fell back to 5%. In contrast, Spain and Ireland followed an upward trend, particularly after 2007 and the United Kingdom remained nearly stable.
Moving on to the rest of the period, in 2008, most of the figures saw a dramatic raise except Germany. Spain, in particular, saw the sharpest increase, with its unemployment rate surging from about 8% in 2007 to nearly 20% in 2010, making it the highest among all five nations.
In contrast, Germany’s rate dropped by approximately 2 percent over the same period. Similarly, Ireland also experienced a significant rise, reaching around 13% by the end of the period. Greece and the UK saw moderate increases at nearly 12% and 7%.