Hong Kong’s labor market has seen its sharpest drop on record, underscoring the territory’s challenges with an aging population and outflow of talent.
The territory’s working population last year fell 94,100, down 2.4 percent, according to data released on Monday by the Hong Kong Census and Statistics Department.
It is the largest decline in the territory’s labor force since the government began keeping records in 1985.
Photo: Bloomberg
Hong Kong is running an uphill battle as the government seeks to kick-start an economy that recorded its third annual contraction in four years. Tens of thousands of people, including lawyers and bankers, left the territory following the National Security Law and strict COVID-19 pandemic curbs.
A labor shortage would affect services for the public and the territory’s competitiveness, Hong Kong Chief Executive John Lee (李家超) said at a daily news conference yesterday.
Lee has made attracting talent a key priority for his administration. In October last year, he started a global talent program that includes a two-year visa plan for high-income workers and top university graduates.
So far, the program has mostly attracted interest from Chinese. Most of the about 10,000 applications are from the mainland, according to local media.
The territory is also competing with Singapore to attract wealth business. The Hong Kong government last month announced that it would cut taxes for family offices.
One of Hong Kong’s biggest hurdles is staffing its tourism sector dented by COVID-19 curbs.
The industry, along with exports, could help the economy grow by an estimated 7.6 percent, according to a Goldman Sachs Group Inc forecast.
TARIFF TRADE-OFF: Machinery exports to China dropped after Beijing ended its tariff reductions in June, while potential new tariffs fueled ‘front-loaded’ orders to the US The nation’s machinery exports to the US amounted to US$7.19 billion last year, surpassing the US$6.86 billion to China to become the largest export destination for the local machinery industry, the Taiwan Association of Machinery Industry (TAMI, 台灣機械公會) said in a report on Jan. 10. It came as some manufacturers brought forward or “front-loaded” US-bound shipments as required by customers ahead of potential tariffs imposed by the new US administration, the association said. During his campaign, US president-elect Donald Trump threatened tariffs of as high as 60 percent on Chinese goods and 10 percent to 20 percent on imports from other countries.
Taiwanese manufacturers have a chance to play a key role in the humanoid robot supply chain, Tongtai Machine and Tool Co (東台精機) chairman Yen Jui-hsiung (嚴瑞雄) said yesterday. That is because Taiwanese companies are capable of making key parts needed for humanoid robots to move, such as harmonic drives and planetary gearboxes, Yen said. This ability to produce these key elements could help Taiwanese manufacturers “become part of the US supply chain,” he added. Yen made the remarks a day after Nvidia Corp cofounder and chief executive officer Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) said his company and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) are jointly
United Microelectronics Corp (UMC, 聯電) expects its addressable market to grow by a low single-digit percentage this year, lower than the overall foundry industry’s 15 percent expansion and the global semiconductor industry’s 10 percent growth, the contract chipmaker said yesterday after reporting the worst profit in four-and-a-half years in the fourth quarter of last year. Growth would be fueled by demand for artificial intelligence (AI) servers, a moderate recovery in consumer electronics and an increase in semiconductor content, UMC said. “UMC’s goal is to outgrow our addressable market while maintaining our structural profitability,” UMC copresident Jason Wang (王石) told an online earnings
MARKET SHIFTS: Exports to the US soared more than 120 percent to almost one quarter, while ASEAN has steadily increased to 18.5 percent on rising tech sales The proportion of Taiwan’s exports directed to China, including Hong Kong, declined by more than 12 percentage points last year compared with its peak in 2020, the Ministry of Finance said on Thursday last week. The decrease reflects the ongoing restructuring of global supply chains, driven by escalating trade tensions between Beijing and Washington. Data compiled by the ministry showed China and Hong Kong accounted for 31.7 percent of Taiwan’s total outbound sales last year, a drop of 12.2 percentage points from a high of 43.9 percent in 2020. In addition to increasing trade conflicts between China and the US, the ministry said
RSS