Margie Markland

The Philippines’ unemployment rate dropped to its lowest this year as more Filipinos were absorbed by the labor market, according to the latest data released by the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA).



Based on preliminary data of the Labor Force Survey (LFS) released by PSA on August 7, the unemployment rate has sunk to 3.1% in June from 4.1% in May.

This translates to 1.62 million unemployed Filipinos in June 2024 from 2.11 million recorded in May of the same year.

The figure is the lowest reported this year and matched the record set in December last year, marking the lowest jobless rate in nearly two decades.

"In terms of magnitude, the number of unemployed persons in June 2024 was registered at 1.62 million," PSA said. 

"This was lower than the number of unemployed individuals in June 2023 at 2.33 million and in May 2024 at 2.11 million," it added.

On the other hand, the employment rate rose to 96.9% from 95.5% in the previous month.

This is equivalent to about 50.28 million employed Filipinos in the said month compared to 48.87 million in May.

The services sector accounted for 58.7% of the employed persons, followed by agriculture with 21.1%, and industry with 20.2%.    

The PSA also recorded an underemployment rate of 12.1%, a slight increase from 12.0% in June 2023.

This uptick equates to 208,000 employees seeking more work hours or an additional job.

The LFS surveyed 11,028 households or 33,161 people over 15 years old, with data collected over 18 days from June 8 to 28.