The ABS quarterly labour force data for November 2013 showed a continued rise in labour underutilsation, which hit a 14.5 year of 13.6% in trend terms (see next chart).
Today, the ABS has released new data showing that underemployed Australia’s are waiting longer to find more work, with the median duration of insufficient work of Australia’s underemployed part-time workers increasing to 30 weeks in 2013, up from 26 weeks in 2012:
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Of the 912,200 part-time workers, just over a quarter (26 per cent) stated they would prefer to work more hours, with over half of these (55 per cent) preferring to find full-time work (35 hours or more)…
This was a significant increase to the 24% of part-time workers who said they would prefer to work more hours in September 2011 and 2012…
Underemployed part-time workers are people who usually work less than 35 hours a week, would prefer to work more hours and are available to start work with more hours within four weeks. In September 2013, there were 817,200 underemployed part-time workers, a significant increase of 86,300 from 2012.
Yet another indication that the Australian labour force is soft.
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.
