The unemployment rate for September 2025 fell to 3.8 percent, slightly lower than last month’s 3.9 percent, the Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) said Thursday.
The PSA said the number of unemployed persons in September was 1.96 million, down from 2.03 million in August. However, the number of unemployed individuals rose annually from 1.89 million recorded in September 2024.
Employment and sectoral growth
The employment rate reached 96.2 percent in September 2025, representing 49.60 million employed persons-higher than the 96.1 percent recorded in August.
The volume of employed persons declined annually from 49.87 million recorded in September 2024, the PSA added.
The services sector maintained the largest share of employment at 61.3 percent, followed by the agriculture sector at 20.9 percent and the industry sector at 17.8 percent.
The subsectors reporting the highest employment levels were wholesale and retail trade, repair of motor vehicles, agriculture and forestry, and construction.
The construction subsector registered the highest annual employment gain, adding 514,000 workers, the PSA said.
Four other subsectors that showed high annual increases after construction were fishing and aquaculture (313,000); accommodation and food services (307,000); human health and social work activities (183,000); and agriculture and forestry (126,000).
The PSA also recorded the subsectors with the largest monthly increases in September, with the education subsector gaining the highest increase, 223,000 new employees.
Following education were agriculture and forestry (129,000); human health and social work activities (117,000); mining and quarrying (113,000); and accommodation and food services (85,000).
Based on the PSA’s findings, 64.1 percent of employed persons were wage and salary workers, 27.6 percent were self-employed without employees, 6.6 percent were unpaid family workers, and 1.7 percent were employers in their own family-operated businesses.
Among the employed persons, 50.5 percent worked in private establishments, while 9.3 percent were employed in government or government-run corporations.
The PSA also detailed the underemployment rate, which stood at 11.1 percent in September 2025-higher than last month’s 10.7 percent.
Of the 49.6 million employed persons, 5.52 million ‘expressed desire to have additional hours of work, have an additional job, or have a new job with longer hours of work.’
The PSA said 58.5 percent of the 5.52 million worked less than 40 hours a week, while 41.5 percent worked 40 hours or more.
As for youth employment-or those aged 15 to 24-the PSA recorded a labor force participation rate of 31.6 percent in September 2025, lower than 33.3 percent in August 2025.
The employment rate for the same age bracket decreased to 88.4 percent from 89.9 percent in September 2024, the PSA added.