Hong Kong’s unemployment rate sticks at 6.4pc

Hong Kong’s seasonally adjusted unemployment rate stood at 6.4 percent from August to October 2020, unchanged from the previous July-September period.

The reading was better than the 6.6 percent median forecast in a Bloomberg survey of economists.

The jobless rate in retail, accommodation and food services sectors declined by 0.5 percentage point to 11.2 percent in August-October, government data showed.

But the unemployment rate of the transportation sector surged by 0.6 percentage points to 6.2 percent, the highest in close to 17 years after Cathay Pacific Airways said in October it will slash more than 5000 jobs and close a regional carrier in a massive restructuring due to the coronavirus outbreak.

Total employment jumped by around 2,900 to 3,627,700 while the labor force in the same period was almost unchanged at 3.88 million. The number of unemployed, not seasonally adjusted, decreased by around 2,000 to 257,800 and number of underemployed also fell by around 1,100 to 148,000.

“Labour market conditions remained difficult, but showed further signs of stabilization as the local epidemic situation stayed contained during that period,” said Law Chi-kwong, the Secretary for Labour and Welfare.