THE number of unemployed Filipinos rose slightly in September compared to the previous month, according to data from the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA).

The PSA recorded 2.26 million unemployed individuals in September, up from 2.21 million in August.

Year-on-year, however, the latest figure was lower than September 2022’s 2.50 million.

The unemployment rate stood at 4.5% in September 2023.

The number of underemployed persons was 5.11 million out of the total 47.67 million employed individuals, translating to an underemployment rate of 10.7% in September, lower than August’s 11.7%.

”Underemployed persons are those who express the desire to have additional hours of work in their present job, to have an additional job, or to have a new job with longer hours of work,” the PSA said.

Services continued as the top sector in terms of the number of employed persons, with a share of 60.4%, followed by agriculture (21.5%) and industry (18.1%).

An employed person worked an average of 40.8 hours per week in September 2023, higher than the 39.6 hours per week in the same month last year.