German unemployment rose for a ninth consecutive month in December as a slowing economy resulted in employers trimming their workforces, dpa cited data released Thursday by the labour office as showing. But the gain was less than expected, with the labour office saying the seasonally-adjusted number of people out of work had risen by 3,000 month-on-month. This led to job queues across the country swelling to 2.942 million. Analysts had forecast an increase of 10,000 after the number of those out of work had risen by 5,000 in November. In seasonally unadjusted terms, the numbers out of work jumped by 88,000 to 2.84 million in December. The average number of people out of work in 2012 stood at 2.897 million, or 79,000 less than in 2011. The unemployment rate came in at 6.8 per cent in 2012, compared with 7.1 per cent the previous year, the labour office said.
