The unemployment rate last month fell to 3.61 percent, declining for the seventh consecutive month, as fewer people quit or lost their jobs to downsizing and closures ahead of the Lunar New Year holiday, the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) said yesterday.
The latest data represented a downturn of 0.03 percentage points from a month earlier and a 0.05 percentage point retreat from a year earlier.
After seasonal adjustments, the rate was 3.7 percent.
Photo: CNA
“The job market had fully recovered from COVID-19 outbreaks, but unemployment might climb slightly higher this month, when discontented workers tend to quit after collecting year-end bonuses,” DGBAS Deputy Director Chen Hui-hsin (陳惠欣) said.
The job market has recovered to the level prior to a nationwide level-3 COVID-19 alert in May last year, judging by the unemployment rate and the number of jobless people, Chen said.
The number of unemployed shrank by 3,000 people, or 0.72 percent, to 430,000 after the number of people who lost their jobs due to downsizing and closures fell by 4,000 and those who quit by 2,000, the agency said.
An increase of 2,000 people lost their temporary or seasonal positions, it added.
The jobless reading could rise 0.04 to 0.08 percentage points this month, Chen said.
The unemployment period extended 1.6 weeks to 21.7 weeks, while it was 26.6 weeks for first-time job seekers, the agency said, adding that it takes longer for people find jobs in January.
By education level, people with at most a bachelor’s degree had the highest unemployment rate of 5.12 percent, followed by people with a high-school education at 3.38 percent, people with graduate degrees at 2.66 percent and people with a junior-high education at 2.59 percent.
People aged 20 to 24 had the highest jobless rate at 12.1 percent, followed by the 15-19 age bracket at 8.67 percent, the 25-29 group at 6.27 percent and the 30-34 group at 3.41 percent.
People aged 45 or older had the lowest unemployment rate of 2.17 percent, it said.
The government is closely monitoring a conflict between Russia and Ukraine to quickly respond to any effects in might have on the local job market, Chen said, adding that it is too early to tell how the conflict might affect the economy.
The nation’s unemployment is lower than that of South Korea, at 4.1 percent, but higher than Kong Kong’s 3.5 percent and Japan’s 2.5 percent, the agency said.
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