THE Statistical Institute of Jamaica (Statin) has downplayed an uptick in Jamaica’s unemployment rate which it on Wednesday reported as 5.4 per cent for January 2024.

This is above the 4.2 per cent unemployment rate reported by Statin last October, but the entity says there should be no comparison with previous labour force surveys due to procedural changes.

“In previous iterations of the labour force survey, the January labour force would have had the reference week in December and in December it’s a completely different labour market than January morning, which is why it is a breakthrough series. Changes are significant, and therefore there is no direct comparison, but going forward we can compare,” said deputy director general of Statin Leesha Delatie-Budair, who was speaking at the media launch of the Revised Labour Force Survey at the Jamaica Pegasus hotel on Wednesday.

Director of the Surveys Division at Statin Dr Natalee Simpson emphasised that changes made to the definition of employment would not deem the figures comparable.

“Previously we would use what we call the relaxed definition, that is the persons not employed and they are available for work but they may, or may not be seeking employment, but now we are using the strict definition which requires that people meet all three criteria. You are not employed, you are available for work, and you are seeking employment.

“So previous resolutions from the ICLS [International Conferences of Labour Force Survey] allowed the flexibility; however, with the additional indicators that we will be reporting on we have to move to the strict definition and this is an additional change to our new labour force,” said Simpson.

She added that the January Labour Force Survey saw a change in the reference week from the third week of December to the first full week of January, which was January 7-13.

“The one-hour criteria is used to identify persons who are considered employed in the labour force and this is for primarily two reasons, for international comparability, but also to ensure that the smallest unit of labour that goes into the production of goods and services is captured in the labour force… So, if during the reference week an individual is a full-time university student but they may have a business, as long as that person was working for at least one hour during the reference week, they are captured as employed, even though they are a full-time university student and they focus mostly on going to school,” Simpson explained while listing the changes to survey procedures. Simpson pointed out that these changes were made to expand the statistical output from the survey which would allow Statin to extract more information in response to a changing labour force and to provide a more comprehensive view of Jamaica’s labour market.

In the meantime, Delatie-Budair announced that in January 2024, the 5.4 per cent unemployment rate was higher among females at 7.1 per cent when compared to males which was at four per cent.

She said there were 80,700 unemployed persons, and females accounted for 61.2 per cent of those unemployed.

“When examined by age group the unemployment rate was highest for youth at 16 per cent and lowest for persons 55 years or older at 1.7 per cent. For those of prime working age [25-45], the unemployment rate was 4.4 per cent,” she noted.

As it relates to people outside the labour force, Delatie-Budair said 620,200 were neither available, seeking, nor willing to obtain employment; however, of this amount 113,900 were also retired and another 236,900 were in school.

Additionally, the remaining 269,500 were outside the labour force for various reasons including illness and home duties.

There were also 100,700 youth who were categorised as ‘NEET’ — not employed, not enrolled in educational activities or currently in training.

Delatie-Budair also shared that in January 2024, there were 1,486,400 persons in the labour force, with an overall participation rate of 68.9 per cent.