The number of employees in the industrial and service sectors shrank by 93,000 in June, a record 1.14 percent decrease from May, as the job market took a hit from the domestic COVID-19 outbreak and tougher disease prevention measures, the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) said yesterday.
The two sectors employed 8.02 million people in June, with job losses most evident at hotels and restaurants, which shed 30,000 employees, the agency said.
There were 17,000 job losses at art, entertainment and recreational facilities, and 11,000 in the retail and wholesale sector, it said.
Photo: CNA
“The situation may have hit the bottom after the government late last month allowed dine-in services to recommence, and movie theaters, gyms and recreational establishments to reopen,” DGBAS Deputy Director Chen Hui-hsin (陳惠欣) told an online news conference in Taipei.
Compared with a year earlier, job losses increased 0.53 percent, suggesting this year’s virus outbreak has had a bigger impact on employment, the agency said.
The accession rate — the number of new employees added to the payroll — stood at 1.74 percent, down 0.21 percentage points from a month earlier and 0.27 percentage points from a year earlier, it said.
The exit rate was 2.88 percent, up 0.28 percentage points from May and 0.98 percentage points from a year earlier, as a growing number of people stopped looking for a job, it added.
The number of employees totaled 8.13 million in the first six months of this year, a 0.39 percent gain from the same period last year, after the manufacturing and service sectors raised their headcounts, the agency said.
Average monthly take-home pay in June declined 0.5 percent month-on-month to NT$42,625, but grew 0.94 percent from a year earlier, it said.
Total compensation — including performance-based commission and overtime pay — fell 3.43 percent month-on-month to NT$51,288, or an annual decline of 5.96 percent, it added.
The nationwide COVID-19 level 3 alert caused wage losses of 8.57 percent, 4.47 percent and 3.09 percent for workers at entertainment and recreational facilities, hotels and restaurants, and other service providers respectively, the agency said.
In addition, electricity suppliers and financial services providers paid commissions and bonuses in May, creating an unfavorable comparison in June, it said.
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