The employment statistics they don’t want to talk about
Australia Area Profile – March 2016
-
Working Age Population (15-64) : 15,790,200
-
Employment Rate (15-64) : 72.3 %
-
Participation Rate (15+) : 64.9 %
-
Unemployment Rate (15+) : 5.7 %
-
Youth Unemployment Rate (15-24) : 12.0 %
As the Coalition wander around the country claiming to have created 300,000 jobs last year, here are some employment statistics they don’t want to talk about.
The March 2016 Labour Force Survey showed there were 729,600 people unemployed.
During March full-time employment decreased 8,800 while part-time employment increased 34,900.
While the number of unemployed decreased by 7,300, there were 9,700 who just stopped looking for work giving a net increase of 2,400 new people unemployed.
The monthly Internet Vacancy Index (IVI), published by the Department of Employment, is based on a count of online job advertisements newly lodged on SEEK, CareerOne and Australian JobSearch during the month.
As such, the IVI does not reflect the total number of job advertisements in the labour market as it does not include jobs advertised through other online job boards, employer websites, word of mouth, in newspapers, and advertisements in shop windows, but it does give a good indication of comparative changes in numbers of advertised vacancies.
In seasonally adjusted terms, the IVI declined by 1.5% in March 2016 with falls in all occupational groups, and in all states and territories. Total vacancies were 159,419.
Over the year to March 2016, the strongest falls were recorded in Western Australia (down by 19.3%) and South Australia (5.2%). On a regional level, the strongest falls were recorded in Perth (down by 21.2%), Central Queensland (20.9%), Fleurieu Peninsula & Murray Mallee SA (17.8%), and Pilbara & Kimberley WA (17.8%).
Since April 2012, vacancies have fallen by 55.3% in Western Australia.
It is also informative to look more closely at the type of jobs being advertised.
Over the year, vacancies increased across the three highest skill levels. The strongest rises were recorded for skill level 1 (commensurate with a Bachelor Degree or higher, up by 7.4%) and skill level 2 (commensurate with an Advanced Diploma or Diploma, up by 7.2%). Skill level 5 (commensurate with a Certificate I or secondary education) fell by 4.8%.
Vacancies rose for Professionals (up by 6.9%), Managers (5.5%) and Technicians and Trades Workers (3.4%), while Labourers recorded the strongest decline (down by 10.7%).
The largest increases in vacancies at a more detailed occupational level were recorded for Medical Practitioners and Nurses (up by 1,351 vacancies), Carers and Aides (695 vacancies), Corporate Managers (489 vacancies), Hospitality, Retail and Service Managers (470 vacancies), and Health Diagnostic and Therapy Professionals (468 vacancies).
The largest fall in vacancies was recorded for Hospitality Workers (down by 815 vacancies), followed by General-Inquiry Clerks, Call Centre Workers, and Receptionists (367 vacancies), Sales Assistants and Salespersons (310 vacancies), and Cleaners and Laundry Workers (255 vacancies).
To summarise, there is very little entry level work available for unskilled labour, and what there is, is part time. That can only get worse if the Coalition implement their PaTH scheme.
14 comments
Login here Register here-
Jennifer Meyer-Smith
-
Kaye Lee
-
Keitha Granville
-
Alison White
-
Jennifer Meyer-Smith
-
Kaye Lee
-
bobrafto
-
PeterStevenson
-
Kaye Lee
-
Kyran
-
Andreas Bimba
-
Gezza
-
Gangey1959
-
Andreas Bimba
Return to home pageAs you point out, Kaye, the Dept of Employment statistics are not particularly accurate. They don’t account for word by mouth jobs. They don’t also reflect the groups often cut out of job opportunities: Regional, Mature Age, Disabled people are examples.
Put employment services back wholly in the hands of a revitalised Centrelink without any private contractors involved, derive the accurate statistics of welfare recipients and then the Dept of Employment can access those statistics from Social Security and together they can provide proactive employment programs that marry professional and non-professional jobs with the UNemployed and UNder-employed, according to their credentials.
I agree about the reintroduction of a Commonwealth employment service.
It would give jobs to thousands of public servants, stop the rorts, and actually be able to hook people up with job vacancies.
I also like the idea of a fleet of buses that could convey young people (and the fitter not so young) to areas of seasonal employment – transport and temporary accommodation co-ordinated by the CES. We should be looking after our young people first rather than foreign backpackers.
Apparently the PaTH scheme isn’t legal – who would have thought that a system which allows employers to pay people less than minimum wage wouldn’t be ok ? Unbelievable.
REAL jobs they said, REAL traineeships they said. BS we say. Cheap labour.
I’d be interested to find out just how many of those vacancies are actual jobs and not agencies filling their books or RTOs pushing their training courses. I used to be a WFD ‘supervisor’ – most people had many stories of applying for advertised positions, going through a series of interviews and then being told the job was theirs – MAYBE – if they just completed this $20,000 course with the RTO conveniently located right next door and if something was available when they graduated. Yeah right!
Spot on, Alison.
The vast majority of vacancies are filled by people who are already employed changing jobs.
Kaye
What was the deficit when Abbott took over and what is the current deficit now, googling it is hopeless for me. Thanks
It’s a simple as this the better you are educated the greater the chance of you securing employment, as there are a bigger percentage of vacancies at the higher skills levels.
bobrafto
12-13 $18.8 billion
13-14 $48.5 billion
14-15 $40.4 billion (I think)
15-16 $39.9 billion
This is a very useful page to look at net debt and current deficit at any particular time
http://www.finance.gov.au/publications/commonwealth-monthly-financial-statements/
This was the latest release
http://www.finance.gov.au/sites/default/files/mfs-march-2016.pdf
There was a really good article on ABC about this, suggesting that “Youth unemployment is the canary in the job mine.” Well worth a look.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-05-12/jericho-youth-unemployment-is-the-canary-in-the-job-mine/7404834
One of the comments finished with “I can also think of 457 other reasons why people remain unemployed.”
“there is very little entry level work available” seems to depend on which visa you entered on. Oh, look over there, an election. Thank you, Ms Lee. Take care
Just a reminder as it’s been mentioned many times before on the AIMN site, the Modern Monetary Theory economists have solved our unemployment and underemployment problem! The federal government simply needs to stimulate the economy by having moderate fiscal deficits (spending exceeds tax) year after year thereby increasing consumption demand and generating employment and in addition providing a jobs guarantee scheme that provides adequately paid employment to those who still can’t find work.
Ideally deficits should be funded by monetary finance or “money printing” by the central bank rather than the sale of treasury bonds which incur an interest expense. Money spent into existance to fund economic expansion is not inflationary as the money supply simply keeps pace with economic growth. The federal government regulates the size of the fiscal deficit to keep unemployment near to zero similar to how the central bank now regulates the official cash rate. Monetary finance significantly behond this level will eventually be inflationary so should be avoided.
This is not a new idea and most post war governments implemented such policies until neoliberalism started to take hold in the late 1970’s.
Vital issues such as stopping global warming and ensuring ecological sustainability must and can be concurrently addressed.
All government expenditure must still be wisely targeted and efficiency, productivity, value for money, good planning, innovation, fighting corruption, fraud, indolence and waste and so forth still remain vital so as to maximise the overall benefit to the population as a whole.
And today the PM won’t mention the current redundancy round (the 2nd in recent years) at Flinders University when he visits to plug the light rail link there in Adelaide today.
Despite all of the bullshit to the contrary, from all sides, 457 visa holders are a major problem for Australian job seekers, and are being ripped off and rorted to the max by those who utilise them, (eg the luverly ms geeican whinehard at her Roy Hill dirt mine.)
If there was a minimum wage for 457’s, say $90,000 pa, or $46/hr, with the accompanying regulations that all wages and super HAD to go into Australian based and controlled accounts, The foreign workers would be a whole lot less attractive as a cheap labour force, and would only be utilised in the cases 457’s were designed for. This would open up a whole 1 1/2 million or so more jobs (at the last count) that could be filled by real workers. I’d go and work for ms whinehard for $35 like a real mining worker. I’m qualified. I’d even stay in the local town on my time off, and stimulate the local economy. (FIFO has a lot to answer for as well.)
The more people who can get real jobs, at livable wages, means that there is more money being spent in the local economies, and more tax being paid, so everybody wins.
Another suggestion in Australia’s current employment crisis is to remove the GST completely from 100% Australian Made, leave it at 10% for Assembled in Australia, and raise it to 25% for fully imported. That would give Australian companies a fighting chance, and also mean that any and all imported goods are starting off on an equal footing, FTA’s etc notwithstanding. Country of Origin/Construction needs to be clearly marked, on everything, from canned food to cars.
Well said Gangey.
457 visas were brought in so foreign workers with special skills that were not readily available locally could work here on important major projects. I used to work for Toyota and was involved in building the Altona assembly plant in Melbourne over 20 years ago. Quite a lot of Japanese workers were brought in using the 457 visa. Even here the justification was doubtful as nearly all of the work they did could have been performed by locals but their wages were probably good.
The 457 visa was not intended to be a source of cheap labour undercutting locals but that is what it has become under our corrupt neoliberal Liberal and Labor governments. Your suggestion of a generous minimum wage for 457 visa jobs is a good one or we could just abolish this visa category.
Your suggestion about preferential tax treatment and import tariffs to assist local trade exposed businesses is also sound. Good industrial policy can help create a large number of jobs. No amount of deficit spending is likely to reinvigorate our nations manufacturing and associated service industries if they remain totally exposed to tariff free and subsidised import competition.
The FTA’s are a deception as they leave our markets totally exposed while our main competitors continue to block our exports using a wide range of non tariff restrictions. Despite our new FTA with China, a number of cases of our exports being blocked have been reported. When the FTA with Thailand came into effect under Howard, a torrent of cars were (and still are) imported from them while our car exports to them were totally blocked using a ‘luxury’ car tax. This is the most important single factor in the demise of our car manufacturing industry.
The only good industrial policy is ‘playing to win’ which is the way all our Asian neighbours and the EU play the trade game. Our appalling neoliberal governments are not nieve, they know we are being screwed but that’s the way they want it. Their real agenda is to look after their mining industry and financial industry puppet masters by deliberately destroying most of our manufacturing industry so that we import more stuff which lowers the value of our dollar. A low dollar makes our mineral resources and bulk agricultural exports more competitive and profitable. Our corrupt neoliberal Liberal/Nationals and Labor governments have preferentially favoured one segment of our economy at the expense of another even though it has led to the net loss of millions of secure well paid jobs.