Sluggish employment seen in Metro Manila

The job market for large enterprises in Metro Manila was sluggish in the first quarter of 2014, according to the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA).

In a report, the PSA said that in the three months to March, the labor turnover rate—the difference between jobs gained and jobs lost—inched up by 0.59 percent.

“Sluggish employment can be attributed to the lower economic growth rate registered in first quarter of (this) year compared to the year ago—5.6 percent and  7.7 percent, respectively,” the agency said.

Even then, first quarter employment was “slightly better” than the negative -0.02 percent recorded for the same period of 2013.

However, it was much slower than the 3.22 percent seen in the period of October-December 2013.

For every 1,000 enterprise workers in the National Capital Region (NCR), a net of six people were added during the three months to March.

For every such group, 101 new hires joined, but 95 quit or were fired. The hiring rate was recorded at 10.06 percent while the separation rate was 9.47 percent.

Employment in the services sector improved by 0.46 percent, agriculture by 8.73 percent, and industry by 0.85 percent.

Among the 18 industries covered, the labor turnover rate in the first quarter was best in agriculture, forestry and fishing (8.73 percent); administrative and support service activities (3.42 percent); and manufacturing (2.16 percent).

On the other hand, employment was worst in mining and quarrying (-5.33 percent); construction (-3.58 percent); and professional, scientific and technical activities (-1.55 percent).

Other industries that showed moderate gains were real estate activities (1.9 percent); other service activities (1.5 percent); water supply, sewerage, waste management and remediation activities (1.33 percent); and financial and insurance activities (1.03 percent).

Sectors that also showed growth but were practically at a standstill included transportation and storage; human health and social work activities; information and communication; arts, entertainment and recreation; electricity, steam, gas and air conditioning supply; and accommodation and food service activities.

Further, the net turnover rate was also negative for wholesale and retail trade (-0.78 percent) and private education (-0.35 percent).

The PSA observed that large enterprises in a majority of subsectors—12 out of 18—took in new employees more because of the need to replace those who were let go than due to business expansion.

Also, based on the survey, more people lost their jobs because they were laid off than because they quit.

Layoffs instead of quitting were most pronounced in the subsectors of wholesale and retail, mining and quarrying, and construction.

Quitting rather than firing was most prevalent in administrative and support service, real estate, and health and social work.

The data is part of the PSA’s survey of 921 large corporations in the National Capital Region, which were drawn from the agency’s 2013 list of NCR enterprises.