The number of employed people increased by around 200,000 for the fourth consecutive month last month. According to the “June Employment Trends” released by the National Statistical Office on the 16th, the number of people employed aged 15 and over last month was 29.091 million, an increase of 183,000 from the same month last year. The increase in the number of employed people showed double-digit growth for six consecutive months. After a decline of 52,000 last December due to the temporary end of a job project, the number rose by 135,000 in January, changing direction in just one month, and increased by 136,000 in February.
In March and April, the numbers rose by 193,000 and 194,000, respectively, and in May, the figure increased by 245,000, marking the first time in 13 months that it exceeded 200,000. Thus, an upward trend of around 200,000 continued for the past four months, although the increase has slightly tapered off after six months.
Looking at specific industries, employment in agriculture, forestry, and fishing dropped by 141,000, construction by 97,000, and manufacturing by 83,000. The Social Statistics Director of the National Statistical Office, Gong Mi-sook, commented that while the decrease in manufacturing is smaller compared to March and April, it slightly increased compared to the previous month, indicating it’s important to monitor trade and tariff negotiations.
The effects of the supplemental budget allocation are difficult to analyze immediately; however, it’s suggested that since industrial budget allocations have been made, they could impact employment. However, due to the nature of statistics, calculating the exact impact post-execution remains challenging.
Conversely, the health and social welfare services sector saw an increase of 216,000, the professional, scientific, and technical services sector added 102,000, and the education services sector grew by 72,000.
In terms of job status, the number of regular employees rose by 318,000 and temporary employees by 58,000, whereas daily workers decreased by 63,000. By age, employment increased among those over 60 (up 348,000) and in their 30s (up 116,000), while there was a significant decline in those in their 20s, which fell by 152,000. Employment among young people aged 15 to 29 decreased by 173,000.
The employment rate for those aged 15 and over was 63.6%, a 0.1 percentage point increase compared to the same month last year. The employment rate for those aged 15 to 64, based on OECD comparison criteria, rose by 0.4 percentage points to 70.3% compared to last year. However, the employment rate for the youth aged 15 to 29 dropped by 1.0 percentage points to 45.6%, continuing its 14-month decline.
The number of unemployed stood at 825,000, a decrease of 32,000 from last year, with the unemployment rate dropping by 0.1 percentage point to 2.8%. The economically active population, consisting of the employed and unemployed, was 29.915 million, an increase of 151,000 from a year ago. The economically inactive population increased by 42,000 to 15.828 million compared to the previous year. Among them, the number of people categorized as ‘rested’, meaning those neither seeking work nor engaging in job searches, rose by 60,000 compared to a year ago. The number of discouraged job seekers decreased by 32,000 to 341,000.