More than 61 percent of the population 15 years old and over are in the labor force

The labor force participation rate (LFPR) of the Ilocos Region was estimated at 61.7 percent in October 2020. This accounted for 2.2 million people 15 years old and over who were either employed or unemployed in October 2020. The LFPR in the region decreased by 1.7 percentage points from 63.4% in 2019 to 61.7% LFPR in 2020.

Employment rate registers at 88.5 percent

The total number of employed persons was reported at 1.9 million persons of the estimated 2.2 million in the labor force in October 2020. The proportion of employed persons to the total labor force was estimated at 88.5 percent lower than the national estimate of 91.3 percent.

The percentage of employed persons in the Ilocos Region decreased by 6.2 percentage points from 94.8 in October 2019 to 88.5 percent in October 2020.

Employed males decreased to 61.8 percent in October 2020

Of the estimated 1.9 million employed persons in October 2020, 61.8 percent were males and 38.0 percent were females.

There was a decrease in the percentage of employed males in the region by 0.8 percentage points. The decrease in males corresponds to the increase in the percentage of employed females in the region by 0.8 percentage points.

Most employed persons have junior high school education

In terms of educational attainment of employed persons in Ilocos Region, 907 thousand employed persons have junior high school education of which 79.0 percent graduated while 21.0 percent did not graduate in October 2020.

College level of education accounted for 624 thousand employed persons of which 65.4 percent earned a bachelor’s degree while 34.6 percent did not finish college. Employed persons with an elementary level of education recorded 290 thousand of which 64.8 percent graduated and 35.2 percent did not.

The percentage of the employed persons with no education completed recorded 10 thousand persons equivalent to 0.5 percent of the employed person in Ilocos Region.

More than 61 percent of employed persons are in the services sector

Employed persons were grouped into three broad sectors, namely, agriculture, industry, and service sector. The services sector recorded the highest employment in October 2020 accounting for 56.2 percent of the employed persons in the Ilocos Region. Employed persons in Agriculture sector comprised 27.4 percent followed by the Industry sector with 17.6 percent of the total employed persons.

In October 2020, the employed persons in the Services sector and Agriculture sector climb by 1.2 percentage points and 0.2 percentage points, respectively. This corresponds to the decrease of employed persons in the Industry sector of 1.4 percentage points

About 30.5 percent of workers were engaged in elementary occupations

Among the occupation groups, workers in the elementary occupations have the largest group making up 30.5 percent of the total employed in the Ilocos Region. Service and sales workers composed the second largest occupation group which accounted for 17.3 percent, followed by skilled agricultural, forestry, and fishing workers (13.8%), and managers (13.2%).

Wage and salary workers contributed more than 60 percent of the total employed

Employed persons can be classified into four classes of workers which are wage and salary workers, self-employed workers without any paid employee, employers in own family-operated farm or business, and those unpaid family workers. Wage and salary workers composed of 62.6 percent of the total employed, of which workers in private establishments accounted the largest share (46.4%), followed by workers in government or government corporation (11.2%), workers in private establishments (4.8%), and workers with pay in own family-operated farm or business (0.2%).

The second largest group of class of workers were the self-employed without any paid employee making up 22.9 percent of the total employed in October 2020. The employer in own family-operated farm or business accounted for 8.7 percent while the unpaid family worker comprised 5.8 percent.

Full-time workers make up 60.5 percent of the total employed persons

Employed persons are either full-time workers or part-time workers. Full-time workers refer to those who worked for 40 hours or more in a week, while those who worked for less than 40 hours were considered part-time workers. Of the total employed persons of Ilocos Region in October 2020, nearly 1.2 million persons (60.5%) were full-time workers while 765 thousand (39.0%) were part-time workers. Those who did not report for work during the reference week comprised 0.5 percent. In addition, the average hours worked per week in October 2020 was 39.2.

Unemployment in Ilocos region climb to 11.5 percent

In October 2020, the unemployed persons in Ilocos Region numbered about 254 thousand resulting in an unemployment rate of 11.5 percent. Of the total unemployment in October 2020, unemployed males were 55.2 percent while 44.8 percent were females.

The unemployment rate in Ilocos Region increased by 6.2 percentage points in October 2020 from the unemployment rate of 5.2 in October 2019.