One thing I noticed on my recent trip to Malaysia was the number of job advertisements. Walk through any mall, or along a street with retail outlets, restaurants, or cafes, and you’d see posters or banners advertising “competitive salaries”, “generous benefits”, and “great career progression”. They were everywhere.
I remembered back to my university Macroeconomics 101 class and how some level of unemployment—but not too much—is considered healthy for an economy. The reason for this is that if an economy is at “full employment”, or 0% unemployment, then no one is looking for jobs. There will be a huge demand from companies for people, but no supply from workers to meet that demand. The US economy, for reference, tries to maintain a level of unemployment in the 3-5% range; allowing for a healthy amount of movement in the labour market.
So when I saw the number of job advertisements in Malaysia, I guessed they must currently have a relatively low unemployment rate. After some googling, I found out the unemployment rate in November 2022 was 3.6%, down 1% point on November 2021 at 4.6%.
Although Malaysia’s unemployment rate is above the generally accepted “full employment” rate of 3%, Malaysia is very close to the line. It seems my anecdotal observations and the data check out.
I’m not an economist, but a few of you are! I’d love your thoughts on today’s post—my connecting-the-dots is simplistic, and there’s almost certainly nuance that I’ve missed.