NO RESPITE:

The government says Spain’s unemployment rate rose more than half a percentage point in the third quarter to 21.5 percent.

The National Statistics Institute said Friday the country’s jobless ranks swelled by nearly 145,000 in the July-September period. The jobless rate in the second quarter was 20.9 percent.

The total number of people unemployed as of the end of the third quarter was 4,978,300.