The unemployment rate climbed to 4.03 percent last month as the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic began to bite, surpassing 4 percent for the first time in the past 42 months, the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) said yesterday.
Last month’s figure is the highest for April in the past seven years, DGBAS data showed.
The jobless rate expanded for the third consecutive month after posting 3.64 percent, 3.7 percent and 3.72 percent respectively in the first three months of this year, DGBAS senior executive officer Chen Hui-hsin (陳惠欣) told a media briefing.
Photo: CNA
The gauge accelerated last month with a monthly gain of 0.31 percent, the highest for a single month in the past 11 years, as more firms in the service sector, hurt by the outbreak, dismissed employees while cutting back on operations or shutting down, Chen said.
The number of unemployed people last month was 481,000, an increase of 36,000 from a month earlier, mostly due to business downsizing and factory closures, the DGBAS said.
The number of employed people fell to 11.46 million, down 46,000 from March, with a decline of 34,000 in the service industry, 9,000 in the manufacturing industry and 3,000 in the agriculture industry, the data showed.
Among service industries, tourism and dining lost 10,000 employees from March, customer service workers fell by 4,000, entertainment and recreation decreased 3,000, finance lost 2,000 and transportation dropped 1,000, the DGBAS data showed.
The healthcare and real-estate industries bucked the trend, each gaining 1,000 employees from a month earlier, the data showed.
After seasonal adjustments, the jobless rate rose 4.1 percent, the biggest rise since January 2014, Chen said.
The number of people whose work hours decreased rose, suggesting that local companies are contracting operations to cope with declining business, the DGBAS said.
The number of people working fewer than 35 hours per week surged to 400,000 last month, increasing 139,000 from 261,000 in March, Chen said.
The gauge usually predicts joblessness, as firms usually reduce working hours before resorting to layoffs when a situation fails to improve, the agency said.
The rise in the unemployment rate last month was not surprising, as the DGBAS forecast that the pandemic would continue to dampen economic activity after more than 400 people in Taiwan were infected, Chen said.
The agency expects the gauge to improve this month, given that the outbreak is diminishing domestically and private consumption is gradually recovering, although the situation in other nations would still affect the local economy, Chen said.
Taiwan’s unemployment rate is lower than the US’ 14.7 percent, Canada’s 13 percent, Hong Kong’s 5.2 percent, but higher than South Korea’s 3.8 percent and Japan’s 2.5 percent, the data showed.
Netherlands-based semiconductor equipment supplier ASML Holding NV yesterday said that it is planning to hire an additional 1,000 people in Taiwan this year in response to growing demand from clients. ASML had previously planned to recruit 600 people this year, but that the plan has been adjusted upward, ASML vice president and ASML Taiwan general manager Grace Wang (汪佳慧) told reporters. ASML has a workforce of more than 4,500 in Taiwan, accounting for about 10 percent of its global total, Wang said. This year’s recruitment campaign would focus on adding people in the customer support, manufacturing and supply chain domains to assist ASML
Starlux Airlines Co (星宇航空) today unveiled a long-haul network expansion plan at a shareholders’ meeting in Taipei, including direct flights to Barcelona, Spain, and Zurich, Switzerland, as well as a service connecting Taipei, Sydney and New Zealand. Starlux is to become the first Taiwanese carrier to offer non-stop services to the two European cities, while the inaugural oceanic route is expected to expand transit opportunities within the Australia-New Zealand market, Starlux said. Flight services to Chicago, Dallas, Washington and New York are under evaluation, the airline added. Prior to the shareholders’ meeting, the airline earlier this year announced that it would be
UNDER MICROSCOPE: Taiwan detained three people who allegedly conspired to buy servers in Taiwan and export them using fraudulent documentation, prosecutors said Nvidia Corp chief executive officer Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) on Saturday urged Super Micro Computer Inc to tighten up on compliance after Taiwan detained three people this week for allegedly making fraudulent declarations about artificial intelligence (AI) servers made by its US partner. The development marked the nation’s first crackdown on semiconductor smuggling, which grew after the US slapped restrictions on exports of high-end chips such as Nvidia AI accelerators to China. Nvidia is “rigorous” in explaining regulations to all of its partners, Huang told reporters after arriving in Taipei. “Ultimately Super Micro has to run their own company,” he said in response to
Nvidia Corp yesterday announced that CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) would attend an employee meeting in Taipei tomorrow to celebrate the launch of the company’s Taiwan headquarters project. Huang would attend a gathering at the site of Nvidia’s planned headquarters in Beitou Shilin Technology Park (北投士林科技園區), the company said in a statement. After arriving in Taiwan on Saturday last week, Huang told reporters that he plans to meet with Quanta Computer Inc (廣達) chairman Barry Lam (林百里) and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) chairman C.C. Wei (魏哲家), and would attend the groundbreaking ceremony for Nvidia’s Taiwan headquarters tomorrow. Nvidia has not yet applied
RSS