August jobless rate drops to 4.4% – PSA

MANILA, Philippines — The August unemployment rate dropped to 4.4%, the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) reported on Friday.

In a press conference on Friday, National statistician Dennis Mapa reported that PSA’s Labor Force Survey showed that 2.21 million Filipinos were unemployed.

This is lower than the 5.3% rate or 2.68 million Filipinos from August 2022 and also lower than the 4.8% rate in July 2023 or 2.27 million Filipinos.

Underemployment rate also plummeted to 11.7% compared with 14.7% in August 2022 and 15.9% in July 2023.

The country’s employment rate, meanwhile, climbed to 95.6% with 48.07 million Filipinos employed, higher than the reported numbers of August 2022 and July 2023 with 94.7% and 95.2%. respectively.

According to the data reported by the agency, wage and salary workers hold the largest share of employed persons with 62.6%. This is followed by self-employed persons with 27.3% and unpaid family workers at 8.0%.

The spike in employment is attributed to fishing and aquaculture with 572,000; construction with 534,000; Agriculture and forestry with 378,000; human health and social work activities with 153,000 and administrative and support service activities with 143,000.

Given this development, National Economic and Development Authority Secretary Arsenio Balisacan said that the government will continue to create better job opportunities for workers citing the decreased number of middle and high-skilled occupations. 

“To raise the quality of employment further, the Marcos administration is committed to exerting all efforts to shape an attractive business climate for investors who have the resources needed to bring in high-quality and high-paying jobs,” Balisacan said in a statement.