With about 50 million Filipinos with jobs in 2024, the country recorded its highest employment rate in 20 years, according to the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA).
Of the working population, 96.2 percent landed a job in 2024, a share higher than 2023’s 95.6 percent. This is the highest jobs rate since 2005, when the PSA adopted the Labor Force Survey (LFS) to monitor the employment situation in the country. At the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, the employment rate fell to its lowest, at 89.7 percent, as the most stringent lockdowns imposed by the government stopped economic activities.
In a report on Thursday, Feb. 6, the PSA said 670,000 Filipinos were added to the number of employed individuals last year, reaching 48.85 million from 48.18 million in 2023.
The National Economic and Development Authority (NEDA) said in a Feb. 6 statement that the local labor market ended last year "with a stable employment rate and improving job quality."
Notably, both the unemployment and underemployment rates last year reached their lowest levels since 2005.
The jobless rate dropped to 3.8 percent in 2024 from 4.4 percent in 2023. This figure is equivalent to around 250,000 Filipinos getting opportunities to get full-time jobs.
Likewise, the number of employed Filipinos who want additional jobs or extra working hours declined to 11.9 percent from 12.3 percent in 2023. This translates into around 100,000 workers having transitioned to an improved working condition, including decent salary.
December 2024
In December last year, the number of employed individuals increased to 50.19 million from 49.54 million last November, although lower than December 2023’s 50.52 million Filipinos with jobs. This means that over a year, the number of working Filipinos decreased by 339,000.
Relative to December 2023, the majority of job seekers have been employed in the services sector with an increase of 555,000 Filipinos securing positions in the transportation and storage sub-sectors.
“I think this is really the effect of our holiday season because the big ones here are the airport shuttles, the taxi cabs that come. So that’s mainly due to the activities related to the holidays,” National Statistician and PSA Undersecretary Claire Dennis S. Mapa said during a Feb. 6 press briefing.
Transportation jobs include the following: truck driver, taxi/ride-hailing driver, and delivery rider/courier (land); pilot, attendant, and ground crew (air); and seafarer or marine engineer and port worker (water). Jobs covered by the storage and logistics subsectors involve warehousing, inventory, and distribution of goods.
Four other sectors contributed to the ballooning employment number in the services sector, including construction (263,000 additional workers); administrative and support service activities (223,000); public administration, defense, and compulsory social security (211,000); and human health and social work activities (197,000).
Meanwhile, the number of jobless Filipinos last December slightly decreased to 1.63 million from 1.66 million in the previous month, even as it remained higher than the 1.6 million jobless Filipinos in December 2023. The unemployment rates in both December 2023 and 2024 remained unchanged at 3.1 percent, lower than November 2024's 3.2 percent.
NEDA Secretary Arsenio M. Balisacan said pursuing the government strategies outlined in the Philippine Development Plan 2023-2028, which serves as the Marcos Jr. administration's socioeconomic blueprint, is "crucial to sustaining our economic momentum and providing higher earning opportunities for Filipinos."
"Our goal is to sustain job creation, improve the quality of employment, and provide every Filipino with opportunities for long-term economic security," the country’s chief economic planner said.
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