Pandemic expected to weaken job market

Researcher

JOSEPH LAGUERTA, 32, has been trying to get as many odd jobs as possible to replace the daily income of P650 he used to get as a carpenter in Makati City.

Since the implementation of a Luzonwide quarantine due to the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic, he has tried looking for other jobs in Cavite.

“So long as I can bike my way to it, I will take any job. Fortunately, I still receive job orders from time to time… Somehow, my family manages to get by,” he said in Filipino.

But now with his barangay under total lockdown, Mr. Laguerta cannot even go out anymore, except to buy groceries and medicine.

The Philippine economy may decline by as much as 0.6% this year, the National Economic and Development Authority said in its report “Addressing the Social and Economic Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic.”

Job losses are estimated between 116,000 to 1.8 million as the economy stands to lose between P428.7 billion to P1.36 trillion in gross value added or equivalent to 2.1%-6.6% of its nominal gross domestic product (GDP) this year.

“There is no one who is not affected by COVID-19. Everyone is affected due to its social, economic, emotional, psychological and spiritual strain,” Alvin P. Ang, an economics professor at the Ateneo de Manila University (ADMU), said in an e-mail.

University of Asia and the

Pacific (UA&P) School of Economics Dean Cid L. Terosa said via e-mail that those in the informal sector and daily wage earners “will be the ones most affected.”

“We have wage workers who are considered semiformal or non-regular employees, like the drivers of transport network vehicle services like Grab and Angkas, or any commission-based workers who cannot go out and do their usual source of income,” Rene O. Ofreneo, professor emeritus at the University of the Philippines (UP), said in phone interview.

“All of a sudden, the Philippines is facing an employment crisis in different fronts, even after we surpass COVID-19, restarting the labor market will remain a problem,” he said.

Around 35% of the country’s employment came from the informal sector, according to the January 2020 round of the Philippine Statistics Authority’s Labor Force Survey (LFS). Of these, 26.2% were self-employed without any paid employee; 2.4% were employers of their own family-operated farm or business; and 6.2% are working without pay in their own family-operated farm or business.

To aid workers during the Luzon-wide quarantine, the Department of Labor and Employment (DoLE) earlier announced the immediate roll out of P1.3 billion worth of COVID-19 adjustment measures to help about 250,000 workers. Likewise, a P180-million emergency employment program will be given to some 18,000 disadvantaged or displaced workers in the informal sector.