Every day, Nguyen Van Thanh, a ride-hailing motorbike taxi driver, wears thick clothes, covers his face with mask and his hands with gloves, and joins the stream of drivers under the scorching sun of June.

Thanh, 40, works from 6am to 10pm to earn enough money to pay for rent, daily meals and food for his children in his hometown of Thanh Hoa. At noon, when the temperature reaches it peak, he has a nap under a big tree on the streets.

Thanh’s work is hard, but he has no other choice. He lost his previous job after his company shut down, while the income from the rice field in his hometown was not enough to feed five mouths.

“Working as a motorbike taxi driver is the last resort,” he said. “However, you have to work many hours now to get the same income as in the past, because the competition is very stiff."

The competition is stiff because more workers have joined the contingent of motorbike taxi drivers. This indicates that the number of workers losing their jobs has increased as a high number of enterprises are facing difficulties and many have left the market.

A report found that in the first five months of the year, the number of enterprises leaving the market had reached 88,000, which meant that 17,600 enterprises had departed monthly, an increase of 23 percent in comparison with the same period in 2022. 

The number of enterprises leaving the market is 93 percent of those joining the market, an unprecedented rate.

The latest study by the Board for Private Economic Development Research (Board IV) found that over 82 percent of enterprises plan to scale down or suspend their business. 

Among the enterprises that plan to continue their operation, more than 71 percent said they would cut 5 percent of the workforce, while 22 percent said they would cut 50 percent.

Official statistics showed that in the first quarter of 2023, the unemployment rate was 2.25 percent and the labor market continued its recovery momentum, while the number of people with jobs continued to increase compared with the previous quarter and the same period last year. 

The number of workers aged 15 and higher was 52.2 million, an increase of 1 million.

The low figure about the unemployment rate and the report about the recovery of the labor market have no connection with warnings about the number of workers losing jobs.

Minister of Labor, War Invalids and Social Affairs Dao Ngoc Dung said before the National Assembly (NA) last week that 2.25 percent is an objective assessment, calculated in accordance with international criteria. The figure was the result of a survey conducted in one week before the date of the announcement.

Unemployment is understood as the situation of people of working age who have demand for work but don’t have jobs, don’t work, are ready to work, or are looking for a job.

Unemployed workers, in accordance with international standards, are those who are 15 years old or older and have all three factors at the same time: they are not working; they are looking for jobs; and they are ready to work.

If a worker lacks one of the three factors (for example, they don't have a job, but are not ready to work), they will not be listed as jobless. So, the international criteria is not suited in Vietnamese conditions.

The criteria can be reasonable in developed countries, because when laborers lose jobs, they receive unemployment social insurance benefits and unemployment allowance.

The head of the labor ministry said the 3 million workers who had to return to their hometowns recently were mostly mothers with children. As they could not exist in the large cities, they had to return home.

Are the 3 million workers returning to hometowns listed as unemployed? How can they earn a living in rural areas if agriculture just makes up 12 percent of GDP?

A report from the Ministry of Labor, War Invalids and Social Affairs (MOLISA) to the NA showed that 510,000 workers in enterprises were affected in the first half of 2023, including 280,000 workers who lost jobs.

Meanwhile, the statistics agency reported that in the first five months, the number of workers working in industrial enterprises as of May 1, 2023 had decreased by 4 percent compared with the same period last year. 

Analysts noted that the reported number of unemployed workers was mostly from foreign invested enterprises, while domestic enterprises often lay off workers quietly because they try to avoid the duties and responsibilities for laid-off workers.

Tu Giang