Although many studies examined the existence of spatial pattern
of unemployment in some developing and many developed countries in improving
the prosperity or social status and reducing the inequalities in unemployment
between areas of such country, there is still much work to be done.
Some of these studies found spatial pattern for unemployment using different
statistical techniques and geographical mapping. The question is raised
whether such a spatial pattern exists in Jordan? The objective is to investigate
the spatial structure of unemployment rate (UR) across different governorates
to provide implications for policy makers, investigating the hot spots of UR
and showing optical picture of UR. The study design is cross-sectional, where
the data are collected for 12 governorates based on the census in 2008. A
mapping using quartiles is used as a first step to conduct a visual inspection
of UR. Two statistics of spatial autocorrelation, based on sharing boundary
neighbours, known as global and local Moran’s I, were carried out for examining
the global clustering and local clusters, respectively. Out of 12, three
governorates (Balqa, Zarqa, and Tafiela) are found as local clusters in UR.
In conclusion, the UR varies in the visual inspection based on choropleth
mapping across different governorates with black spots in the northwestern,
central and southeastern part of the country. Statistically, no significant global
clustering can be found, but several significant local clusters are found in the
central and western part of the country.