Unemployment now 3.5%

ABS

The seasonally adjusted unemployment rate fell to 3.5 per cent in June 2022, according to data released today by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS).

Bjorn Jarvis, head of labour statistics at the ABS, said: “With employment increasing by 88,000 people and unemployment falling by 54,000, the unemployment rate fell by 0.4 percentage points, to 3.5 per cent.

“This is the lowest unemployment rate since August 1974, when it was 2.7 per cent and the survey was quarterly.”

The unemployment rate continued to fall for men and women (both down 0.4 percentage points).

“The 3.4 per cent unemployment rate for women was the lowest since February 1974 and the 3.6 per cent rate for men was the lowest since May 1976,” Mr Jarvis said.

“The large fall in the unemployment rate this month reflects more people than usual entering employment and also lower than usual numbers of employed people becoming unemployed. Together these flows reflect an increasingly tight labour market, with high demand for engaging and retaining workers, as well as ongoing labour shortages.”

The fall in unemployment through the pandemic has coincided with large increases in job vacancies (480,000 in May 2022). As a result, there was almost the same number of unemployed people in June 2022 (494,000 people) as vacant jobs.

“This equates to around one unemployed person per vacant job (1.0), compared with three times as many people before the start of the pandemic (3.1)”, Mr Jarvis said.

ABSUnemployment