Australia’s unemployment increased by 180,000 people to 1,542,000 in December 2024, according to Roy Morgan research.
This is up by 1.1 per cent to 9.7 per cent of the total workforce, with many fewer people in part time employment following the Black Friday sales period in November.
The Australian workforce increased by 26,000 to a record high of 15,818,000 in December, although overall employment was down 154,000 to 14,276,000 which drove a significant spike in what Roy Morgan calls “real” unemployment.
According to the research firm, a person is classified as unemployed if they are looking for work, no matter when. This can include under-employed people. These estimates were obtained by surveying an Australia-wide cross section of people aged 14 or more.
The increase in unemployment was driven by a drop in part-time employment which led to more people looking for part-time work, up 12,000 to 801,000.
There was an even larger increase in people looking for full-time work, Roy Morgan reported, up 168,000 to 741,000 – the highest level of full-time unemployment since February 2021 nearly four years ago.
Overall unemployment and under-employment also jumped 1.9 per cent to 20.3 per cent in December – the highest rate of unemployment and under-employment since February 2021 nearly four years ago.
In addition to the unemployed, a further 1.68 million Australians – or 10.6 per cent of the workforce – were under-employed, up 132,000 from November – a new record high level of under-employment.
In total 3.22 million Australians (20.3% of the workforce) were either unemployed or under-employed in December – the highest combined figure since August 2020.
Roy Morgan’s unemployment figure of 9.7 per cent is more than double the estimate by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) of 3.9 per cent for November, but is approaching the combined ABS unemployment and under-employment figure of 10.3 per cent.
The ABS has yet to release its December figures.
The latest monthly figures from the ABS indicate that the people working fewer hours in November 2024 due to illness, injury or sick leave was 475,700. This is over 80,000 higher than the pre-pandemic average of the six years to November 2019 (391,100) – a difference of 84,600.
According to the ABS, if this higher than pre-pandemic average of workers (84,600) who are working fewer hours due to illness, injury or sick leave is added to the combined ABS unemployment and under-employment figure of 1,520,600, it creates a total of 1,605,200 people who could be considered unemployed or under-employed, equivalent to 10.6 per cent of the workforce.
Roy Morgan CEO Michele Levine said the latest estimates for December shows unemployment surging to the highest in five months.
“These latest figures for December show the Australian employment market is providing new jobs, but not at a rate to keep pace with the rapidly growing population,” Levine said.
“Over the two years since December 2022 the Australian population has increased by over 1.4 million – more people than live in Australia’s fifth largest city of Adelaide. The increase in population is more than double the average population growth across a two-year period over the last 25 years of 581,000.”
Since December 2022, Levine said the workforce has increased by over 860,000 and the employment level has increased by 700,000.
“As you can see, there is a gap there with employment increases not keeping pace with the growing workforce. That gap, of over 150,000, has led to an increase in unemployment since pandemic restrictions were ended in late 2022.”
Levine said the rapidly inflating Australian population and workforce has led to a persistently high level of labour underutilisation. Since July 2022, she said total unemployed and under-employed has been stuck above 2.5 million.
More recently, over the last 18 months since May 2023, total labour underutilisation has been stuck above 2.7 million and averaged well over 2.9 million since then.
“These figures show that as we close in on another federal election due in the next few months, the Federal Government must make tackling these persistent high levels of unemployment and under-employment the number one priority heading into that election.”