KUALA LUMPUR – Malaysia’s labour market is expected to strengthen further in 2023 and 2024, backed by the positive impetuses in the domestic economy, MIDF Research said.
It said the average unemployment rate is expected to decline further to 3.5% in 2023 and return to pre-pandemic levels of 3.3% in 2024.
“The return of non-citizen workers is expected to boost overall employment and reduce the jobless rate,” the research house said in a note today.
As of the first quarter of 2023, non-citizens’ employment was 4.4% lower than the pre-pandemic level.
For the first half of 2023 (1H 2023), employment grew by 2.7% year-on-year (y-o-y) compared with an expansion of 3.5% y-o-y in 1H 2022, while unemployment eased by 10.4%y-o-y (1H 2022: 14.8%) with the jobless rate averaging at 3.5%.
Malaysia’s unemployment rate hit a new post-pandemic low at 3.4% in June 2023.
Labour force and employment expanded by 1.9% y-o-y and 2.3% y-o-y respectively in June, supported by upbeat domestic economic momentum.
“Continued improvement in the labour market will support consumer spending as the wage recipients to employment ratio reached a new peak of 64.5% back in 2021, among others, thanks to the minimum wage salary policy,” it noted. – Bernama, August 10, 2023
