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The loss of 500,000 temporary migrants and the closure of Australia’s international border to foreign workers has done a wonderful thing for Australia’s labour market – it has pushed the underemployment rate to its lowest level since May 2014, as revealed in yesterday’s April labour market release from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS):
Underemployment lowest in 7 years.
Historically, Australia’s underemployment rate has shown a strong correlation with wage growth – certainly much stronger than the headline unemployment rate – as illustrated previously by Economist Phil Soos, as well on this site (see here).
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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.
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