Unemployment claims up 9.4% in July - INPS

(ANSA) - Rome, September 20 - Social security and pensions agency INPS said Thursday that almost 280,000 applications for unemployment benefit were made in July, up 9.4% with respect to the same month in 2017. It said claims were up 6.2% in the first seven months of 2018 as a whole compared to the same period in 2017. It added, however, that in August requests for the 'cassa integrazione' benefit for people who have been temporarily laid off or had their hours cut by companies in difficulty amounted to 11.17 million hours, down 42.97% on the same period last year.