Macau’s unemployment rate stood at 3.4 percent in the three months to January 31, down 0.1 percentage point from the previous recorded data spanning October to December 2022. The underemployment rate also fell in the reporting period, with a “notable drop” in the number of workers facing that issue within the city’s gaming industry.
“With the relaxation of border measures and a number of events taking place prior to the Lunar New Year [in late January], the demand for local manpower increased,” said on Friday the city’s Statistics and Census Service.
“Among the unemployed searching for a new job, most of them were previously engaged in gaming and junket activities, and in the construction sector,” stated the statistics bureau.
The announcement also said that the city’s overall underemployment rate dropped by 0.7 percentage points to 3.2 percent. The “number of underemployed decreased by 2,500 from the previous period, to 11,900, with a notable drop in … [underemployment for] those engaged in gaming and junket activities,” it added.
The statistics bureau counts as underemployed those who “involuntarily” have “less than 35 hours” of work per week, “and are available to take on additional work”.
Before the relaxation of countermeasures against Covid-19, the city’s casino industry was going through a downturn in terms of business volumes, coinciding with outbreaks of the disease in Macau and in mainland China.
In the third quarter of 2022, a total of 23,300 workers in Macau’s gaming industry – which includes casinos, junkets and lotteries – was recorded as part of the city’s underemployed population, according to official data. That was up 19,200 quarter-on-quarter.
The number of people employed in Macau’s gaming industry in the November to January period rose by 0.2 percentage points, to about 67,800. The gaming sector accounted for 18.8 percent of Macau’s employed population in the reporting period, showed the data.
