Since peaking in December 2014 the number of unemployment beneficiaries has fallen from 431,469 to 406,417
in seasonally adjusted terms. Interestingly other data, paint a similar picture. Internet and newspaper job
advertisements across Australia have lifted for nine out of the last ten months, up by almost 7 per cent on a year
ago. It is clear that the housing led recovery is the key driver of the lift in economic activity, supporting an array of
sectors and no doubt driving the improvement in the labour market landscape.
It is important to keep in mind that the number of short-term jobseekers receiving benefits rises and falls with the economic times, but the number of long-term unemployment beneficiaries is harder to move. So the lift in in longterm jobseekers over the past year is disappointing and highlights that the improvements in labour market conditions are incremental at present and by no means has reached critical mass.
That’s a very wide divergence between short and long. I’m guessing that there’ll also be a strong strong age divergence between them. Judging by that long term chart, which jumps at the start of every year, it’s chock full of school leavers.
David Llewellyn-Smith is Chief Strategist at the MB Fund and MB Super. David is the founding publisher and editor of MacroBusiness and was the founding publisher and global economy editor of The Diplomat, the Asia Pacific’s leading geo-politics and economics portal.
He is also a former gold trader and economic commentator at The Sydney Morning Herald, The Age, the ABC and Business Spectator. He is the co-author of The Great Crash of 2008 with Ross Garnaut and was the editor of the second Garnaut Climate Change Review.
