Daily Ummat ■ Finance Minister Sri Mulyani said the unemployment rate due to the Covid-19 pandemic increased by 2.67 million people. Thus, the total unemployment in August 2020 will be 9.77 million people.
"The unemployment rate, if we see additional unemployment due to Covid-19, is 2.6 million people," Sri Mulyani said at a press conference, Monday (23/11).
She said that this condition occurred in line with the decline in the number of jobs which amounted to 0.31 million people. This makes the total number of people working as of August 2020 as many as 128.45 million people.
Meanwhile, the additional job seekers until August 2020 were 2.36 million people. Thus, the total workforce until August 2020 reached 138.2 million people.
Overall, the total number of workers affected by Covid-19 reached 29.12 million people. In details, 2.56 million additional people are unemployed, 0.76 million people are not in the labor force, 1.77 million people are temporarily unemployed, and 24.03 million people have reduced working hours.
"This will certainly affect their level of welfare. This is a challenge that must be resolved due to Covid-19," Sri Mulyani explained.
In addition, Sri Mulyani stated that the total number of formal workers also fell 4.59 percent. Conversely, informal workers increased as of August 2020.
With this condition, she said the number of poverty this year has the potential to reach 10.96 percent. However, the government is trying to contain it by providing various social assistance (bansos) during the Covid-19 pandemic.
"With social protection, we can reduce the negative impact from 10.96 percent to 9.69 percent, 1.5 percent lower," said Sri Mulyani. (**)
