Australia’s mining industry is driving an increase in job advertisements in the past six months, with job ads in the sector up almost 30 percent in the industry.
Despite claims from mining giants that a tax on profits would bring the sector to its knees, the latest Advantage Job Index found mining and engineering outperformed all other sectors recording a 29.97 percent increase in new job advertisements over the past six months.
“Since the Henry Tax Review recommendations were released in January, miners have not curbed their hiring activities in anticipation of a tax on profits. In fact, they have done quite the opposite. They’ve hit the employment button hard to meet surging global demand,” says Robert Olivier, Director, Global Market Intelligence, Advantage Resourcing.
“The mining industry typically hires contractors rather than permanent employees so they have more flexibility to match labour demand with project wins without the additional costs and responsibilities of full time employees. This increase in jobs is consistent with recent trade data showing that the mining boom is in full swing. Any suggestion that a mining tax could bring the sector undone when all the indicators confirm the sector is booming seems a bit self serving to me,” Mr Olivier says.
Nationally the Advantage Job Index found jobs are up by 2.8 percent from last month with the legal profession being the standout performer at 9.45 percent.
Confirming earlier trends, the August Advantage Job index indicates that employers are well and truly over Canberra’s political paralysis and are very much focused on to getting back to business. “But nor are they taking any chances,” Mr Olivier says. “Yes they are hiring but they’re hedging their bets on the final outcome of the election, favouring temporary (5.2 percent) over full time (2.2 percent) appointments. No doubt they will firm up their recruitment strategies when then there is a definite outcome in Canberra,” Mr Olivier adds.
Given the mining result, unsurprisingly at 47.02 percent Western Australia experienced the biggest increase in advertisements in the past year followed by Victoria (29.32 per cent) and New South Wales (27.63 percent).