Lower Unemployment, Inflation, and Electricity Prices

Last week, the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) released the labor data for November 2024, with the unemployment rate at 3.2 percent—an all-time low except in June 2024 and December 2023 with 3.1 percent.

- Bienvenido S. Oplas Jr.

So this is good news.

Finance Secretary Ralph Recto expressed optimism in their press release that "We are working non-stop to ensure that we open more economic opportunities to Filipinos, so we can provide more and quality jobs to our people and boost our economy."

Also last week, the PSA released the inflation data for December 2024; it was 2.9 percent, good. The highest inflation last year was 4.4 percent in July and the lowest was 1.9 percent in September.

Our full-year inflation has declined from 5.8 percent in 2022 and six percent in 2023 to 3.2 percent in 2024. This is lower than the 2024 inflation of India at 4.9 percent and Vietnam at 3.6 percent, but higher than Indonesia and Korea's 2.3 percent. Note that Vietnam, India, and the Philippines have the fastest GDP growth in 2024 (Q1-Q3) among the world's top 50 largest economies. Somehow, an illustration of the "Phillips' Curve"—more growth and lower unemployment leads to higher inflation.