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Same as their male counterparts, retirement/old age was the most common reason for women being economically inactive, followed by engagement in household duties.
The Census and Statistics Department (C&SD) has published a report titled Women and Men in Hong Kong - Key Statistics (2023 Edition). It draws together gender-disaggregated statistics and indicators from a wide variety of sources with a view to depict the situation of women and men in major economic and social spheres.
Key statistics are as follows:
| Female | Male |
Year-end population in 2022 | 4,062,800 | 3,409,800 |
Labour force in 2022 | 1,890,300 | 1,886,000 |
Labour force participation rate in 2022 | 52.9% | 64.7% |
Number of employed persons in 2022 | 1,823,700 | 1,789,500 |
Underemployment rate in 2022 | 1.9% | 2.8% |
Unemployment rate in 2022 | 3.5% | 5.1% |
Median monthly employment earnings (HK$) in 2022 | 15,300 | 21,000 |
- all figures cited are in HK$ -
As compared with 2021, the female and male labour force in 2022 decreased by 2.9% and 1.9% respectively. The overall labour force participation rate also decreased (females: 54.2%; males: 65.8% in 2021). Analysed by age group, in 2022, the labour force participation rate was lower for women than for men in each age category, except for persons aged 15-24.
Among employed persons, the median monthly employment earnings of females increased from $15,000 in 2021 to $15,300 in 2022, while that of males increased from $20,000 in 2021 to $21,000 in 2022. Analysed by occupation, the yearly growth in the median monthly employment earnings of plant and machine operators and assemblers was the highest for both sexes, increased by 15.4% and 9.4% for women and men respectively.
On the other hand, the numbers for economically inactive women and men (or the non-labour force) were 1,682,300 and 1,028,500 in 2022. Retirement/old age was the most common reason for being economically inactive (45.3% of all economically inactive women and 63.9% for their male counterparts). Meanwhile, the second most common reason cited by women was the engagement in household duties (35.2%), and that for men was attending educational institutions (19.2%).
In the civil service, as a whole, there were 173,664 civil servants in end-2022, of which 67,231 were women and 106,433 were men. The numbers of female and male directorate officers increased from 555 and 819 in mid-2021 to 572 and 820 respectively in mid-2022. The proportion of female directorate officers increased slightly from 40.4% in mid-2021 to 41.1% in mid-2022, while that of males decreased slightly from 59.6% in mid-2021 to 58.9% in mid-2022.
As for non-official members serving on public sector advisory and statutory bodies, the number of women rose from 1,835 in 2021 to 1,844 in 2022, whereas that of men dropped from 4,022 to 3,942 during the same period.
In terms of education, in 2022, 65.8% of women had attended upper secondary education and above; the corresponding figure for men was 69.5%. On the other hand, there were 32.0% of females and 37.5% of males who had attended post-secondary education.
Other findings:
- The expectations of life at birth for females and males in 2022 were 87.2 years and 81.3 years respectively, decreasing from 87.9 years and 83.2 years in 2021.
- The number of married women and men were 1,979,900 and 1,797,900 in 2022 respectively, denoting a decrease of 1.2% and 0.6% respectively as compared with 2021.
- In 2021, the number of single mothers was 56,249, which was about 3.5 times the number of single fathers (16,030).
Talking about Hong Kong's population policy, Chris Sun, Secretary for Labour and Welfare of Hong Kong, mentioned at a forum earlier that the government has launched a series of initiatives to encourage more women to participate in the labour market. These initiatives include the ‘Neighbourhood Support Child Care Project’, ‘Community Dining Room’ to provide a social space for women to help each other, as well as a pilot scheme for after-school care services targetted to be launched in September this year.
"From my perspective, a friendly working environment and more flexible working hours may be more helpful to encourage more women who have given birth to return to the workplace. This requires everyone to work together," said Sun.
In addition, he said that the Labour Department will launch a new edition of the Good Employer Charter, which aims to continuously encourage employers of different trades and scale (including small and medium enterprises) to formulate family-friendly employment policies by assessing different family responsibilities borne by their employees and help them fulfil their work and family needs simultaneously to create a family-friendly harmonious workplace.
Lead image / Women and Men in Hong Kong - Key Statistics (2023 Edition)
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