Malaysia’s labour market continued its recovery at a steady pace in the third quarter of 2022. The normalisation of all economic and social activities strengthened the job market and reduced unemployment.
The Department Of Statistics Malaysia (DOSM) in its release today (Nov 17) titled Labour Market Review, Third Quarter 2022 stated in Q3 2022, labour force continued recorded a more significant increase of 2.6 per cent year-on-year to 16.44 million persons, while the labour force participation rate (LFPR) strengthened further by 1.1 percentage points to 69.4 per cent.
The number of employed persons rose by 3.6 per cent to record 15.83 million persons while employment-to-population ratio continued to trend up to 66.8 per cent.
In the meantime, the number of unemployed persons decreased by 134.4 thousand to 611.8 thousand persons, registering an unemployment rate of 3.7 per cent which slowly returning to how it was before the pandemic.
The continuous recovery in labour market also was reflected by the number of people working less than 30 hours per week which persisted in trending down, with a decline of 38.2 per cent from Q3 2021 to 287.2 thousand persons in this quarter. Subsequently, the rate of time-related underemployment dropped 0.9 percentage points to 1.2 per cent. Meanwhile, skill-related underemployment which comprised more than one-third of employed persons with tertiary education decreased by 0.9 percentage points to 36.8 per cent in Q3 2022.
Looking at the labour demand in the economic sector, the number of jobs increased by 3.2 per cent year-on-year to record a total of 8.68 million jobs. Filled jobs which comprised of 97.8 per cent, increased by 3.1 per cent over the same quarter of the preceding year to record 8.48 million.
Meanwhile, jobs opening in the economy which was indicated by the number of vacancies posted the highest growth since Q4 2021, elevated by 9.9 per cent to 191.3 thousand vacancies during Q3 2022.
As Malaysia’s economy strengthened further by 14.2 per cent in Q3 2022 while employment continued its positive growth, labour productivity as measured by value added per employment posted an increase of 10.1 per cent registering the level of RM24,241 per person.
During the same period, total hours worked ascended by 10.0 per cent to 9.04 billion hours. Thus, labour productivity per hour worked grew 3.8 per cent to bring the level of productivity at RM42.50 per hour.
Moving into the fourth quarter of 2022, economic and social activities continue to normalise as current Malaysia’s leading index is anticipating that the economy will continue to uphold its growth momentum.
Hence, the overall labour market performance is also foreseen to sustain its positive momentum and be more resilient, signalling that Malaysia’s labour market is recovering steered by the current development of the economic activity.
However, the viewpoint is subjected to the various challenges in mitigating the effects of slow global economic growth and trade activity, as well as the impact of the flood disaster that may occur following the expected North East Monsoon or monsoon season in Malaysia which begin in early November 2022 and continue until March 2023.
The Labour Market Review (LMR) is a quarterly release by Malaysian Bureau of Labour Statistics (MBLS), Department of Statistics, Malaysia (DOSM) that brings official statistics to life through reviews and features which highlighted the most recent trends in labour market. The quarterly statistics is consolidated in a narrative to provide readers with a comprehensive view on Malaysia’s labour market.
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