Overview of Unemployment Rates Across Mexico
As of June 2025, Mexico has maintained an unemployment rate below 3% of the economically active population (PEA) for 32 consecutive months.
This theoretically indicates that the country is experiencing full employment. However, how many states have an unemployment rate above this threshold?
According to data from the National Institute of Statistics and Geography (INEGI), only ten out of Mexico’s 32 federal entities reported an unemployment rate above 3% of the PEA.
States with Highest Unemployment Rates
Coahuila topped the list with an unemployment rate of 4.62% of its active population, taking 16 months to reach this position.
Other states exceeding the 3% unemployment rate in June 2025 were the Federal District, San Luis Potosí, Tabasco, Guanajuato, Aguascalientes, Puebla, Nuevo León, Chihuahua, and Durango.
States with Lowest Unemployment Rates
In contrast, the states with the lowest unemployment rates were Colima, Morelos, Zacatecas, Tlaxcala, Hidalgo, Oaxaca, and Guerrero, all below 2%.
These latter states are characterized by high labor informality, a common issue across the nation where 54 out of every 100 occupied individuals are informally employed.
Unemployment Rate Reduction in Half of Mexican States
Compared to June 2024, half of Mexico’s states have seen a decrease in their unemployment rate. Zacatecas led the way, reducing its unemployment rate from 3.34% to 1.63% of its PEA, a decrease of 1.71 percentage points.
- Estado de México: 1.37 percentage points
- Hidalgo: 1.33 percentage points
- Sonora: 0.79 percentage points
- Tlaxcala: 0.73 percentage points
- Oaxaca: 0.47 percentage points
- Baja California Sur: 0.44 percentage points
- Ciudad de México: 0.41 percentage points
Sinaloa, Tamaulipas, Chihuahua, Aguascalientes, Querétaro, Colima, Baja California, and Jalisco also reported annual unemployment reductions.
States with Unemployment Rate Increases
San Luis Potosí experienced the largest increase in unemployment rate, rising from 2.67% of PEA in June 2024 to 3.88% in June 2025, an increase of 1.22 percentage points.
- Puebla
- Yucatán
- Chiapas
- Nuevo León
- Veracruz
- Coahuila
These increases were more than 0.6 percentage points annually.
Labor Market Uncertainty
Monex, a financial group, states that the labor figures published by INEG do not reflect a deteriorating labor market despite the uncertain commercial environment observed in the first half of 2025.
Monex adds that while the IGAE showed no variation in May (0.0% m/m), indicating a stagnant economy, these results should be analyzed cautiously due to high informality limiting the accuracy of capturing the true labor market state.
Moreover, Monex explains that formal employment behavior suggests signs of weakness since only 87,287 registered jobs were created with the Mexican Social Security Institute in the first half of 2025, a 70.4% decrease compared to the same period in 2024.
This decline comes after losing 46,378 jobs in June 2024, the largest monthly drop in over a decade (excluding pandemic periods), highlighting structural vulnerabilities.
Monex concludes that, amidst ongoing trade tensions with the United States, it will be crucial to observe whether this apparent resilience persists or if it’s merely a temporary effect in a slowing economy.
