(Eagle News)–The unemployment and underemployment rates in the country in January 2019 have gone down, the Philippine Statistics Authority said.
According to results of the Labor Force Survey posted on the PSA website, the employment rate last month was at 5.2 percent, 0.1 percent less than the 5.3 percent registered in January 2018.
According to the survey, Cagayan Valley and Western Visayas had the highest employment rates, at 96.9 percent and 96.1 percent respectively.
The National Capital Region, the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao and Calabarzon posted the lowest employment rates, at 93.6 percent, 93.7 percent and 93.9 percent respectively, the PSA said.
The PSA said workers in the services sector comprised the largest proportion of the population who are employed, or 58.1 percent, an increase from its 55.9 percent proportion of the total employed in 2018.
“Among them, those engaged in the wholesale and retail trade; repair of motor vehicles and motorcycles accounted for the largest percentage (33.6 percent) of workers in the services sector,” the PSA said.
The PSA said workers in the agricultural sector comprised the second largest group of the total employed, at 22.1 percent, while workers in the industry sector made up the smallest group, at 19.7 percent of the total employed.
Underemployment
According to the PSA, the underemployment rate in January 2019 was at 15.6 percent, down from the 18.0 percent in January 2018.
The PSA said visibly underemployed persons, or those who work for less than 40 hours in a week, account for 51.1 percent of the total underemployed in January 2019.
It said those who worked for 40 hours or more in a week made up 48 percent.
The survey registered a labor force participation rate of 60.2 percent given the population 15 years old and over of 72.95 million.