Luke warm employment

Advertisement

By Leith van Onselen

As reported by the Houses & Holes earlier, the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) has released labour force data for the month of October, which reported a -0.8% decrease in the headline unemployment rate to 5.36% from 5.44% in September, but an increase in the total number of jobs across the economy.

The economy added 10,700 (0.1%) over the month, with the loss of -8,000 part-time jobs more than offset by a 18,700 increase in full-time jobs. The labour force participation rate also fell slightly to 65.1% from 65.2% (see below charts).

Advertisement

Jobs growths remains sluggish; a reasonable result given the state of the global economy (see below chart).

Advertisement

And the growth in jobs was broad-based in October, with the exception on Queensland, which continues to lose jobs:

Australia’s employment market remains fairly two speed, with strength in Western Australia masking relative weakness in most other areas of Australia. That said, New South Wales’ employment market continues to improve, experiencing decent jobs growth over the past year:

Advertisement

The one big blemish in this report is that the aggregate number of hours worked continues to trend down, falling by -0.3% over the month and turning negative in every state over the past year, including Western Australia:

Advertisement

Overall, it’s another mixed report, with the slight fall in the headline unemployment rate and the increase in jobs (mostly full-time) offset by the loss of aggregate hours worked. Australia’s employment market also remains unbalanced, with Western Australia providing the lion’s share of jobs growth over the past year, notwithstanding the clear improvement in New South Wales.

Advertisement

Twitter: Leith van Onselen. Leith is the Chief Economist of Macro Investor, Australia’s independent investment newsletter covering trades, stocks, property and yield. Click for a free 21 day trial.

About the author
Leith van Onselen is Chief Economist at the MB Fund and MB Super. He is also a co-founder of MacroBusiness. Leith has previously worked at the Australian Treasury, Victorian Treasury and Goldman Sachs.