Singapore office workers
SINGAPORE: There were a total of 115,900 jobs created
in Singapore for the whole of last year. This was a slight adjustment to an
earlier estimate of 112,500.
The Manpower Ministry said the total
employment growth far exceeded the 37,600 jobs in 2009.
In its labour
market report for 2010, MOM highlighted that the labour market recovered
strongly last year from the 2009 recession, bolstered by the robust economic
performance.
Recruitment companies also said that job-seekers are also
finding work in shorter periods of time.
Foong Wei Liang, Talent
Attraction Manager at Adecco, said: "Due to the fact that employers are going to
need to hire quickly when they have determined that a candidate is right for
their organisation, experienced and qualified job seekers know that they may
have several job offers to choose from.
"Any procrastination from hiring
managers could see lost recruitment opportunities and that's not something that
any organisation wants to endure when the labour market is so tight."
The
services sector contributed the bulk of employment gains of 111,000 in 2010,
almost double that the previous year.
Construction employment grew by
2,500 down substantially from the gains of 25,100 in 2009.
This was
mainly due to the completion of several large building projects and fewer new
projects coming on stream.
Manufacturing employment declined by 1,100.
However, this was much lower than the losses of 43,700 in 2009.
Last
year, local employment grew by 56,200 while the number of foreigners, excluding
foreign domestic workers, employed increased by 54,400.
As at December
2010, there were 1,992,700 locals in employment, forming around two in three of
the 3,105,900 persons employed in Singapore. The remaining 1,113,200 were
foreigners.
Overall unemployment rate was 2.2 per cent last year, down
significantly from 3 per cent in 2009.
Fewer workers were laid off for
the whole of 2010, despite an increase in the last quarter.
Redundancies
for the whole year totalled 9,800 down from 23,430 in 2009. This was the second
lowest redundancy level, since the start of the data series in 1998.
With
the strong economy, job vacancies rose by 23 per cent in December last year,
after dipping slightly in September.
With the tighter labour market,
workers' earnings have risen.
Nominal earnings grew by 7.5 per cent over
the year in the fourth quarter of 2010. Weighed down by higher inflation, real
earnings rose by 3.4 per cent.
Labour productivity has also increased,
driven by the strong output growth. It grew over the year by 7.8 per cent in the
fourth quarter, higher than the 6.2 per cent increase in the previous
quarter.
-CNA/ac
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