A year earlier, the unemployment rate stood at 3.4 percent.
In August 2016, the number of unemployed persons were 2.12 million, a decrease of 130 thousand (-5.8 percent from a year earlier). The number of employed persons were 64.65 million, an increase of 860 thousand (+1.3 percent from the previous year).
The labour force rate grew 1.1 percent from a year earlier to 66.77 million and population aged 15 and over was flat at 110.77 million.
The labour force participation rate increased by 0.7 percentage points to 60.3 percent from 59.6 percent in August 2015.