Emiratis Case

INTRODUCTION

Before the independence of the UAE, its economy was dominated by basic economic activities such as fishing, diving, and simple kind of trading and little agriculture. With the discovery of oil the economy expanded and the oil sector constitutes more than 35% of its GDP. In 2005, the UAE produced about 2.4 million barrels per day, and 85% of it was produced by Abu Dhabi alone. The oil revenue allows the government to spend generously on infrastructure, education, health and job creation.

The rise of oil prices in the 1970s provided the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries with the financial resources which allowed for vast economic development programs that required influx of non-national labor. However, the drop in oil prices in the mid 1980s and the population growth made unemployment an issue in the GCC countries.

Therefore, this report reviews unemployment in the UAE and measures the unemployment rate in Abu Dhabi which is the capital of the federation. Also, it contains some main reasons and the negative side for unemployment and possible solutions that could overcome the problem.

In addition, as a sample; survey method is used for a randomly selected group of national families, applying the widely accepted definition of unemployment rate, which is the number for workers who are at the age of work and seriously seeking for jobs at the prevailing wages as a percent of the total civilian labor force. Then, results will be presented and analyzed with some policy implications.

The report showed particularly high levels of unemployment among women and youth, despite dominating the UAE public sector jobs.

The report defines "unemployment" as more than 15 years and not currently working or seeking work. Overall unemployment rate in the northern emirates stood at 16.6 percent, a figure slightly lower in