— Japan Feb Jobless Rate 4.5%; Jan 4.6%; MNI Forecast 4.6%
— Japan Feb Employment -400,000 Y/Y Vs Jan -480,000
— Japan Feb Employment Posts 3rd Y/Y Drop In Row

TOKYO (MNI) – Japan’s national average unemployment rate fell to
4.5% in February from 4.6% in January, thanks to the first net job
creation in three months and a fall in job cuts, data from the Ministry
of Internal Affairs and Communications showed Friday.

The seasonally adjusted unemployment rate for February came in
slightly lower than the median forecast for 4.6% in a survey of
economists by MNI.

The February figure matched the 4.5% unemployment rate in both
November and December last year but was still higher than 4.4% in
October and 4.2% in September.

In February, the number of payroll jobs rose by 290,000 (+0.5%)
from the previous month to a seasonally adjusted 62.88 million, marking
the first month-on-month rise in three months.

The adjusted number of unemployed fell by 70,000, or 2.3%, to 2.98
million in February, compared with +90,000 (+3.0%) at 3.05 million in
January.

But looking at the longer-term trend, the unadjusted number of
employed people fell 400,000 to 62.26 million in February from a year
earlier, posting the third straight year-on-year drop after falling
480,000 in January.

The workforces continued to shrink in construction, transportation
and postal services as well as wholesale and retail trade, offsetting
steady gains in the heath care industry.

Meanwhile, the unadjusted number of jobless workers fell 140,000 on
year to 2.89 million in February, after falling 190,000 in January.

The data also showed that the number of those who lost their jobs
and were looking for work continued to fall from year-earlier levels in
February while the number of people who quit their job voluntarily to
look for other openings rebounded.

Effective with September 2011 data, the government resumed
releasing the national average unemployment rate based on figures from
all the 47 prefectures, including earthquake-hit areas that were
previously excluded from the data.

The government compiled employment and unemployment data from March
to August 2011 without records from the Iwate, Miyagi and Fukushima
prefectures, the hardest hit by the March 11 earthquake and tsunami that
wrecked the northeastern Pacific coast.

tokyo@marketnews.com
** MNI Tokyo Newsroom: 81-3-5403-4833 **

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