Unemployment will keep rising.

There are more than 230 million people unemployed across the world, according to the UN's International Labour Organisation. This accounts for 7% of the world's workforce. Some countries are even worse off, like the USA, who have recorded high unemployed at 9.9%.

These depressing figures will not be changing any time soon - even though some countries, from Germany to France to Brazil, have come out of the recession. This is because unemployment is a lagging indicator. Once demand in the economy increases, and companies start to produce more, there is a certain time period before they start to actually expand and employ more people. Thus, even though some countries like France have recorded 0.3% growth this quarter, it will be a while before the social costs of the recession go away.