Australian unemployment has increased by 177,000 to over 1.5 million in April 2024.
This is according to Roy Morgan, which added that this is despite overall employment remaining near its all-time high of over 14.2 million, with this figure slightly down by 35,000.
In addition to the increase in unemployment, there was also a slight increase in under-employment, up 18,000 to 1,594,000. Combined, these increases mean a large 3.13 million Australians - or 19.8 per cent of the workforce - were unemployed or under-employed in April.
“This is the first time in over a year that both unemployment and under-employment have increased in the same month with the two usually moving in opposite directions,” Roy Morgan CEO Michele Levine said.
“The increase means overall labour under-utilisation is now at its highest for over three years since October 2020 (3.15 million) during the early days of the pandemic.”
There were 669,000 (up 74,000) looking for full-time work and 866,000 (up 103,000) looking for part-time work.
A significant fall in part-time employment, down 261,000 to 4,903,000, drove the decrease in overall employment, which was mostly offset by a rise in full-time employment of 226,000 to 9,329,000.
“The labour force has experienced rapid change over the last year with a large increase in population (up 717,000) – a rate almost three times higher than the average annual population growth over the last 25 years of 287,000,” Levine said. “This population increase has been the driver of a growing workforce, up by 667,000 to a record high of over 15.7 million in April 2024.
“In turn, the increasing workforce has led to large rises in both employment, up 418,000 to over 14.2 million, and unemployment, up 249,000 to 1,535,000. As well as unemployment increasing 249,000, under-employment is up by 254,000 – a combined figure of 503,000 more Australians either unemployed or under-employed than a year ago in April 2023.
“The figures show that although new jobs are being created, there are not enough jobs being created to soak up the nearly 700,000 people who joined the workforce over the last year and increasing numbers of Australians are becoming unemployed or under-employed.”
This comes as retailers trim down trading costs, including the axing of staff, with fashion businesses such as Myer and Aje confirming redundancies across head office staff this year.
“The sustained increase in unemployment and under-employment over the last year shows the labour market is struggling to provide the right jobs for all those joining the workforce,” Levine continued. “Tackling this continuing high level of unemployment and under-employment must be the number one priority for the Federal Government which is due to hand down a pre-election Federal Budget.”
Roy Morgan’s unemployment estimates were obtained by surveying an Australia-wide cross section of people aged 14 or more. A person is classified as unemployed if they are looking for work, no matter when.