Information from the Statistics and Census Service (DSEC) indicated that both the general unemployment rate (1.8%) and the unemployment rate of local residents (2.4%) for May-July 2018 held stable as in the previous period (April-June). The underemployment rate was 0.6%, up by 0.1 percentage point.

Total labour force was 392,600 and the labour force participation rate was 71.1%. Total employment was 385,500 and number of employed residents totalled 284,300, both up by 100 from the previous period. Analysed by industry, employment in Real Estate & Business Activities registered increase while that in Wholesale & Retail Trade decreased.

Number of the unemployed was 7,100, up by 200 from the previous period. With fresh graduates entering the labour market, the proportion of fresh labour force entrants searching for their first job increased by 5.3 percentage points to 16.1% of the total unemployed.

In comparison with May-July 2017, the labour force participation rate and the umemployment rate dropped by 0.3 and 0.2 percentage points respectively while the underemployment rate rose by 0.2 percentage points.