MANILA, Philippines — The number of jobless Filipinos grew for the third straight month in May, the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) reported on Monday.

The country's jobless rate slightly increased to 4.1 percent in May from 4.0 percent in April. This is lower than the 4.3 percent in the same month last year.

This translates to 2.11 million unemployed Filipinos, 70,000 more than April's figure of 2.04 million.

This is the highest increase since January 2024 when the jobless rate was 4.5 percent.

Meanwhile, underemployment — which counts those looking for more work or an extra job — was down to 9.9 percent from 14.6 percent in April and 11.7 percent in the same month last year.

The number of underemployed was equivalent to 4.82 million. These are people "who have expressed the desire to have additional hours of work in their present job or to have additional jobs, or to have a new job with long hours of work."

The PSA said the number of individuals with jobs reached 48.87 million, higher than last year's 48.26 million and April's 48.36 million.

The services sector hired the most number of workers in May for a share of 61.1 percent in the labor market.

The country's Labor Force Participation Rate in May was 64.8 percent, higher than April's 64.1 percent.

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