Job ads surge locks in rate hike

ANZ job ads are in their strongest surge in three years.

Labour demand often rises at the beginning of the year (the job advertisements series grew 6.2% m/m in January 2019 and 3.9% m/m in January 2017).

The increase in January comes after the unemployment rate dropped to 4.1% and employment increased by 65.2k in December.

Overall, though, the labour market is still pretty sloppy.

While employment and hours worked have grown by about 1% annually, the unemployment rate concluded the year where it began.

Wage growth also appears to have rolled over.

Still, it’s another incremental sign that the RBA will interpret as inflationary in the medium term.

A hike is incoming, I suspect.

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About the author

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.