Australia’s unemployment rate is likely to remain at 5.1 percent according to ANZ Head of Australian Economics Ivan Colhoun, with the ANZ Job Advertisements Series for October showing only a modest 0.6 percent increase in job ads.
The ANZ Job Advertisements Series for October hound an increase of 0.6 percent in the total number of jobs advertised in major metropolitan newspapers, taking the number of job ads to an average of 179,040 per week (seasonally adjusted).
“ANZ Job Advertisements rose modestly in September, ticking 0.6% higher to be 34.6% above year-ago levels. This is the sixth consecutive monthly rise in total job advertisements, although the pace of growth is moderating.” Colhoun said.
The total number of job advertisements remains 35.6 percent below the all-time peak reached in April 2008, just prior to the Lehman Brothers collapse in September 2008.
Internet job ads outstripped the performance of newspaper job ads, with the latter continuing to falter.
“The October rise was driven by a 0.6 percent improvement in the number of internet job advertisements. In contrast, newspaper jobs advertisements experienced a second-consecutive monthly decline, falling 0.3% and have fallen in five of the past seven months.” Colhoun said.
The moderate growth in the number of job ads in October to lead to Australia’s unemployment rate remaining steady at 5.1 percent when the ABS releases its Labour Force Statistics for October later this week.
“While the pace of employment growth has accelerated in recent months, statistical analysis combined with recent trends in business surveys and in the economy’s largest industries (including retail trade and construction) suggests that this pace of growth is set to moderate. In particular, full-time employment will likely cool following two consecutive monthly increases of above 55,000. We also expect a dip in the participation rate following September’s surge and this will likely see the unemployment rate remain steady at 5.1 percent” Colhoun said.