Roy Morgan unemployment falls on record-breaking job ads

Ahead of the Australian Bureau of Statistics’ (ABS) March labour market report later today, Roy Morgan has released its own estimate, with unemployment falling another 0.7% to 7.8% – the lowest since October 2019. However, underemployment rose by 0.6% to 8.4%:

The key changes are as follows:

• Unemployment fell 94,000 to 1.13 million Australians (7.8% of the workforce) in March while under-employment increased 93,000 to 1.22 million (8.4% of the workforce). Overall unemployment and under-employment was virtually unchanged at 2.36 million.
• Workforce increased 80,000 in March as employers hire more workers. The workforce in March was 14,523,000 (up 80,000 from February) – comprised of 13,390,000 employed Australians (up 174,000) and 1,133,000 unemployed Australians looking for work (down 94,000).
• Employment increased driven by an increase in part-time employment. Australian employment increased by 174,000 to 13,390,000 in March driven by an increase in part-time employment, up 289,000 to 4,712,000. However, full-time employment decreased by 115,000 to 8,678,000.
• Unemployment was down in March and is well down on a year ago. 1,133,000 Australians were unemployed (7.8% of the workforce), a decrease of 94,000 from February with fewer people looking for full-time work (down 76,000 to 387,000) and also fewer people looking for part-time work, down 18,000 to 746,000.
• Under-employment was up in March as part-time employment increased. In addition to the unemployed, 1.22 million Australians (8.4% of the workforce) were under-employed – working part-time but looking for more work, an increase of 93,000 (up 0.6% points) from February. When part-time employment increases (up 289,000 in March), under-employment usually increases as well as more people working part-time leads to more people wanting to work more hours.
• Compared to early March 2020, before the nation-wide lockdown, in March 2022 there were almost 200,000 more Australians either unemployed or under-employed (+0.6% points) even though overall employment (13,390,000) is over 500,000 higher than it was pre-COVID-19 (12,872,000).