Job shock: Singapore sees more job seekers than vacancies

This hasn't happened since 2012.

It is indeed worrying that there are more people in Singapore looking for jobs than the number of available career posts, probably due to the subdued demand for labour and ongoing restructuring in some industries.

The Monetary Authority of Singapore stated in its biannual review that the city-state has not seen this scenario since June 2012.

"Reflecting a reduction in job openings, the seasonally adjusted overall vacancy rate fell from 2.6% in H2 2015 to 2.4% in H1 2016, slipping further below its five-year historical average of 2.8%," MAS noted.

During the same period, overall unemployment rate picked up 2%, while incidences of redundancy spiking up 2.4.

Most layoffs were seen in the services industries.

Notably, professionals, managers, executives & technicians (PMET) accounted for more than two-thirds of the residents laid off in the said half year.

"At the same time, while more than half of the job openings in H1 this year were targeted at PMETs, only 39.6% of resident PMETs made redundant re-entered the workforce within six months," the authority stressed.

The labour market has first seen overall net employment slump in the early half of 2015, where it expanded by only 3,600.

For the first half of this current year, even if net employment is up 17,200, it is relatively subdued compared to 1H14.

"Hiring in both the external-facing and domestic-oriented sectors continued to be subdued, following the step-down in H1 last year," MAS said.

The employment decline was most evident in manufacturing (−5,300), with the electronics cluster affected by the reconfiguration of multinational corporations’ world-wide operations, and the marine & offshore engineering segment, which was weighed down by the low oil price environment.

Meanwhile, amidst the tepid domestic demand, manpower gains in the domestically-oriented sectors tapered from 33,600 in H2 2015 to 20,400 in H1 this year, with weakness in new hiring across most segments.