The unemployment rate fell last month to 5.05 percent as many summer interns returned back to school, the Directorate General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) said yesterday.
Last month's jobless rate slid 0.16 percentage points from the previous month and was 0.27 percent lower compared with the figure a year ago, the agency said.
The number of people out of work fell to 510,000 last month from 529,000 in August, with 15,000 jobs being added in the public sector alone.
The decline in jobless rate last month was also due to drops in business closures, staff cuts and first-time job seekers.
The number of unemployed people who lost their jobs because of business closures and job cuts was 210,000 last month, compared with 222,000 in August, according to the DGBAS.
"As the economy recovers, companies are continuing to hire," Chen Jin-Cherng (
For the third quarter, the jobless rate was 5.14 percent, in line with the 5.1 percent predicted by the government, while the fourth-quarter jobless rate should be roughly 4.7 percent, Chen said.
He said the jobless rate for the whole of this year would be below 5 percent, compared with 5.17 percent for last year.
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