EMPLOYMENT
continued. In the third quarter of 1997, the labour force grew by 3.8 per cent over the corresponding period of 1996. Hong Kong's labour force stood at 3.2 million, of whom 61 per cent were male and 39 per cent were female. The seasonally adjusted unemployment rate for the third quarter of 1997 was 2.2 per cent while the underemployment rate was 1 per cent, compared with 2.6 per cent and 1.4 per cent respectively a year earlier.
Of those employed, the majority (79.1 per cent) were engaged in the service sectors 33.9 per cent in wholesale, retail and import/export trades, restaurants and hotels; 11.2 per cent in transport, storage and communications; 12.7 per cent in financing, insurance, real estate and business services; and 21.3 per cent in community, social and personal services. About 10.1 per cent worked in the manufacturing sector.
A structural shift during the past decade has meant establishments in the service sectors now employ six times as many workers as the manufacturing sector. In September 1997, 1 933 932 persons were engaged in establishments in the various service sectors (not including most of the self-employed and those engaged in the provision of personal services), an increase of 0.1 per cent over the corresponding figure in 1996. Only 309 160 persons were engaged in manufacturing sector establishments (excluding outworkers), a decrease of 5.6 per cent compared with a year earlier.
With this continuing shift in employment, many manufacturing workers have been displaced. The Employees Retraining Board, set up in 1992 to help workers displaced from the manufacturing sector to rejoin the workforce by providing suitable retraining, provided 209 731 training places through its various retraining programmes by the end of the year.
The import and export trade was the largest employer in the service sectors, with 510 185 workers in September 1997. Other major service industry groups include the retail trade, restaurants and business services, which had 213 769, 184 930 and 165 416 employees respectively.
Despite declining employment, the clothing industry remained the largest manufacturing industry, employing 76 697 persons in September 1997. Establishments in the printing and publishing industry and the electronics industry were the next two largest groups of employers in manufacturing, employing 45 844 and 33 699 persons, respectively. Details of the distribution of establishments and persons engaged by selected major industry group are shown at Appendices 23 and 24 respectively.
Wages
Wage rates are calculated on a time basis, either daily or monthly, or on an incentive basis according to the volume of work performed. The average wage rate for employees up to the supervisory level, including daily-rated and monthly-rated employees, increased by 7.1 per cent in money terms between September 1996 and September 1997. After discounting for rises in consumer prices, the average wage rate increased by 1.7 per cent in real terms.
In September 1997, the average monthly wage rate for the supervisory, technical, clerical and miscellaneous non-production workers in the wholesale, retail and import/export trades, restaurants and hotels sector was $11,696. This represented an
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