Jamaica sees significant drop in unemployment rate

Jamaica’s unemployment rate fell to a record low of 6.2% in January this year, 0.9 percentage points lower than the figure recorded in October 2021, the Statistical Institute of Jamaica (STATIN) reported.

In its Labor Force Survey for the month, STATIN said the January figure was also 2.6 percentage points lower than the January 2021 survey result.’

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STATIN chief executive Carol Coy said the male unemployment rate fell from 7.6% to 4.8%, while the female equivalent fell 2.5 percentage points to 7.9 %.

The youth unemployment rate fell by 5.1 percentage points to 17.7% for the reporting period, compared to January 2021 and Coy pointed out that results for both men and women were down around 5%, the latter registering the largest decline.

“Unemployment for young men was 14.5%, while that for women was 21.8%,” she said.

STatin also reported that the total number of people employed in January 2022 increased by 4.8% or 57,800 people to 1,257,100, compared to the corresponding period last year.

Women saw the biggest increase – 5.5% – compared to 4.3% for their male counterparts and STATIN said the overall labor force grew by 24,800 people, or 1.9%, to 1,340 600 in January.

“There has been a greater increase in the number of women in the labor force. While the male labor force grew by 9,200 to 721,400, the female labor force grew by 15,600 to 619,200. The increase in the number of women accounted for 62.9% of the total increase” , Coy said, adding that the number of people classified as out of the labor force (neither employed nor unemployed) stood at 755,600 in January, which is still a significant figure.

“Men outside of the labor force are down 8,000, while women are down 14,400,” Coy told reporters.

CMC/