To assess the impact of increasing unemployment in Hungary, the author performed a case-control study comparing people who committed suicide in 1993-1994 with a random sample of non-suicidal individuals. Data on suicides came from interviews with relatives & other survivors, whereas information on the control sample was collected as part of a large nation-wide longitudinal survey conducted in 1994. The results indicate that unemployment greatly increases the risk of suicide, even after controlling for age & sex.