SPAIN has smashed its all-time record for people in work, new data has revealed – with foreign workers filling more than two-thirds of new jobs.
Government figures showed 128,500 jobs were created last month alone, with a record 22.47 million workers nationwide registered with Spain’s Social Security in June.
It came as the number of unemployed in Spain fell below 2.3 million for the first time since 2008 – 113,000 fewer than last year.
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Yolanda Diaz, Spain’s Minister of Labour, said: “As long as there is still one person unemployed, we will keep working to win rights, raise wages, and implement time tracking, because every hour worked must be an hour paid.”
She added: “Behind every figure is a life that looks upon the future with hope.”
According to Ministry of Labour figures, 42% of registered work contracts in June were permanent – more than four times their share five years ago.
The boom in Spain’s labour market is being driven by several factors, experts say, including a burgeoning tourism industry.
Spain is currently on course to break last year’s record for tourist arrivals of nearly 97 million visitors, with most forecasts placing the figure for 2026 between 98 and 100 million.
Meanwhile, a total of 86,600 of the new jobs created in June were taken up by foreign workers – more than three times the figure recorded in 2025.
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It comes shortly after Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez’s migrant regularisation scheme came to a close on Tuesday, logging a record 1.3 million applications.
The unprecedented demand means the programme is on track to surpass Spain’s last major regularisation in 2005, when nearly 700,000 people applied and more than 570,000 obtained legal status.
Sanchez, of the left-wing PSOE, has defended the initiative as an economic necessity, arguing that hundreds of thousands of migrants are already living and working in Spain, often in informal jobs with limited legal protections.
He has also added that bringing more workers into the formal economy is expected to increase tax revenues, with studies estimating that each regularised migrant could generate a net fiscal benefit of around €4,000 through taxes and social security contributions.
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