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  Labour Market: 3rd Quarter 2001 Report Released

      (cont'd)

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  Among the locals retrenched, the hardest hit were still the low skilled production, cleaning & related workers forming 46% of workers retrenched in the third quarter this year, although this has come down from 57% in 1997 prior to the Asian crisis. Next were the professionals, managers, executives & technicians with 37%, up from 23% in 1997. This reflects the increasing vulnerability of mid-career and mature managers and executives to losing their jobs. The remaining 17% of locals retrenched in the quarter were from clerical, sales & service jobs.

  The worsening economy dragged down the number of job vacancies by more than half to 14,123 in September 2001 from 32,385 registered a year ago. Similarly, the job vacancy rate (i.e. vacancies expressed as a percentage of total staff demand) fell sharply to 1.3% as compared to 3.1% in September 2000. The plunge in job openings, coupled with the rising number of job seekers, led to a further deterioration in the ratio of job vacancies to unemployed persons to a new low of 0.32 in September 2001 (seasonally adjusted). In other words, at the aggregate level for every 100 job seekers, there were only 32 job openings, as compared to 61 in June 2001 and over 200 openings prior to the Asian crisis.

  Growth in earnings has moderated. Both the nominal and real earnings grew year-on-year at a slower pace of 4.8% and 3.9% respectively in the third quarter of 2001, compared to 6.0% and 4.2% a quarter ago.

Employment Outlook
 
The September 11 terrorist attacks have derailed any hopes of recovery by year-end. Business sentiments in the near term have been badly dampened and even more companies are planning to scale back their headcount in the fourth quarter of 2001 as revealed by the surveys on business expectations conducted by the Department of Statistics and the Economic Development Board.
There are more manufacturing firms which expect to cut jobs in the coming quarter, especially those in precision engineering, process engineering, specialty & industrial chemicals and electronics. Nevertheless, firms in the marine industry are still recruiting in view of an anticipated increase in ship repairing activities. The services employment outlook turned grim for the fourth quarter as opposed to still hopeful sentiments three months ago. The most pessimistic were firms in the banking and real estate services industries. However, there were still pockets of firms in the hotel, retail trade and catering industries which plan to hire workers to cope with the year-end festive season.

  Despite the gloomy market conditions, there are still job opportunities at both the higher and lower ends. At the higher end, there continues to be employment opportunities for health professionals, educators, research scientists and infocomm manpower. At the semi to low skilled levels, there is demand for nursing aides, healthcare assistants, sales associates, waiters, security personnel, cleaners, maintenance & conservancy workers, transport labourers, mobile vehicle drivers and mechanics.
Singapore's deepening recession has impinged on the labour market. More workers have lost their jobs while new job opportunities are becoming scarce. With the protracted slump in global electronics and uncertainties in the US economy feeding deeper into the Singapore's system, the positive earnings growth posted so far may come to a standstill when the year draws to a close as companies exercise wage restraint. Unemployment rate could rise to around 4.5% by end of the year and is expected to worsen in the year ahead as the next batch of new entrants join the labour market, adding to the existing pool of job seekers.

For More Information
The report is available online at the Manpower Research and Statistics Department's Internet website :
http://www.mom.gov.sg/manpower/manrs/manrs5.htm
 

Singapore Government Press Release 14 Dec 2001

 

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