Nearly 3 million out of work
Labour ministry data showed that the number of registered jobseekers in mainland France rose by 41,300 last month to 2.987 million, in the biggest monthly increase since the 2008-09 financial crisis.
The total jobless figure — which does not account for a threatened wave of upcoming layoffs at companies like Peugeot and Carrefour — was the highest since June 1999, marking an increase of 1.4 per cent over one month and 8.5 per cent over one year.
President Francois Hollande has seen his ratings slide since he came to power in May as he battles to live up to campaign promises to bring down stubbornly high unemployment amid a rash of job cuts in recent weeks.
The labour ministry said in a statement that the deterioration only toughened the government's resolve to push through measures to encourage hiring.
The government will present a bill on Wednesday for 150,000 state-sponsored jobs, which it aims to debate in parliament in September so the law can take effect in January.
With a growing number of companies announcing layoff plans, the government is also scrambling to limit damage on a case-by-case basis. Industry Minister Arnaud Montebourg said in a newspaper interview on Sunday that he would look into union reports that Carrefour was planning hundreds of cuts.
However, the government has so far found few solutions to keep companies from axing jobs even after Peugeot's announcement last month that it would cut 8,000 posts in France by 2014 sounded alarms in the corridors of power.
In another sign of labour market weakness, the data showed that the number of job offers received by the state employment agency from employers had fallen 7.7 per cent in July from June, the biggest drop since January 2009.
Labour ministry data is the most frequently reported domestic jobs indicator for France, though it is not prepared according to widely used International Labor Organisation (ILO) standards nor expressed as an unemployment rate of a number of jobseekers compared to the total workforce.
