Taiwan had 457,000 jobless citizens in November 2015, equivalent to an unemployment rate of 3.91% and rising 0.01% on month and 0.02% on year, according to statistics released by the directorate general of Budget, Accounting and Statistics on December 22, NewsNow reported. Taiwan’s population aged 15 and over stood at 19.90 million in November, consisting of 11.69 million for labor force and 8.21 million for non-labor force with a labor participation rate of 58.74%, DGBAS indicated. In November, Taiwan’s unemployment rate was lower than the 10.8% in France, 7.1% in Canada, 5.2% in the UK, 5.0% in the US, and 4.5% in Germany but higher than the 3.4% in South Korea, 3.3% in Hong Kong, 3.1% in Japan and 2.0% in Singapore, DGBAS said. DGBAS said the month-on month increase in the November jobless rate largely reflected a slowdown in the local economy, which prompted many enterprises in the local manufacturing sector to cut working hours. Last month, DGBAS cut its forecast for Taiwan’s 2015 GDP growth from 1.56% to 1.06%, citing poor export performance.
