Australia’s seasonally adjusted unemployment rate rose to 4.6 per cent in August, while employment increased by 39,000 people and unemployment rose by 28,000, according to the latest Labour Force data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS).
Part-time employment increased by 46,000 people in August, while full-time employment fell by 6,000, the ABS said.
Australia’s seasonally adjusted unemployment rate rose to 4.6 per cent in August, despite employment increasing by 39,000 people, according to the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS).
Part-time jobs rose by 46,000, while full-time employment fell by 6,000.
The participation rate increased to 67.1 per cent, while underemployment eased to 6.2 per cent.
Sean Crick, head of labour statistics at the ABS, said, “This month there was 39,000 more people in employment, and 28,000 more people in unemployment. This August we recorded a higher proportion of people who were previously not in the labour force moving to being unemployed, compared to recent years.”
The ABS said in a press release growth in the size of the labour force lifted the participation rate by 0.2 percentage points to 67.1 per cent. The underemployment rate fell by 0.1 percentage points to 6.2 per cent.
Hours worked increased by 14 million hours in August, reversing a 14-million-hour decline in July. Crick said this was partly due to more employed people working zero hours in July than is usual for that month. Employment and hours worked recorded similar annual growth, rising by 1.6 per cent and 1.7 per cent, respectively.
In trend terms, the unemployment rate edged up to 4.6 per cent in August, while trend employment increased by 0.2 per cent and hours worked remained unchanged. The trend underemployment rate and underutilisation rate were steady at 6.3 per cent and 10.8 per cent, respectively.
Fibre2Fashion News Desk (CG)
