Manila (Philippine Daily Inquirer/ANN) - Despite the Philippines' robust economic growth last year, nearly 100,000 more Filipinos became unemployed in January compared to the same period last year, according to the National Statistics Office (NSO).
The NSO's Labor Force Survey showed that the unemployment rate increased to 7.4 percent in January compared to the 7.3 percent registered in January 2010.
This means that the number of unemployed rose to 2.9 million from 2.8 million in January 2010, or an increase of 92,000, the survey showed.
The increase in the number of unemployed in January contrasted to a drop of 27,000 recorded from 2009 to 2010.
This rise in unemployment comes even after the economy grew by 7.3 percent last year - the highest in more than two decades.
According to the NSO, there were more unemployed males--62.7 percent of all unemployed--than females, 37.3 percent.
"Almost half (48.9 percent) of the unemployed were in age group 15-24 years. More than one-third (35.1 percent) of the unemployed were high school graduates, and almost two-fifths (39.1 percent) reached college education," the NSO said.
On the other hand, the underemployment rate decreased from 19.7 percent in January 2010 to 19.4 percent in January.
The number of underemployed persons in January 2011 was estimated at 7.1 million.
Employed persons who desire to have additional hours of work in their present job, or to have an additional job, or to have a new job with longer working hours are considered underemployed.
"About 60.5 percent of the total underemployed persons were working less than 40 hours during the reference week. Such type of underemployed workers are classified as visibly underemployed. Those working for 40 hours or more accounted for 37 percent," the NSO said.
