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Today’s release of the December 2018 Labour Account data series provides a wealth of data. One thing it allows us to do is take a look at incomes across various industry sectors and how they have changed in the past 12 months. The table below shows, for selected industries, the year-on-year changes in the average hourly income per employed person, the average number of hours actually worked per employed person, and the resultant average income per employed person.
| Industry | Avg Hourly Income % y/y |
Avg Hours Worked % y/y |
Avg Income % y/y |
| Retail | 6.1 | -4.4 | 1.4 |
| Public Admin | 2.4 | -1.1 | 1.2 |
| Healthcare | 1.6 | -0.3 | 1.2 |
| Construction | -3.1 | -1.9 | -4.9 |
| Education | 0.2 | 0.4 | 0.7 |
| Accomm & Food | 2.6 | 0.8 | 3.4 |
| Manufacturing | 4.7 | -0.8 | 3.9 |
| Mining | 0.8 | 0.2 | 1.1 |
| ALL | 2.8 | -1.0 | 1.8 |
Across all industries average hourly income rose by 2.8% but the average number of hours fell 1.0% resulting in an increase in average income of just 1.8% (just below inflation).
Many industry sectors saw average hours worked fall, particularly Retail where average hourly incomes rose sharply. The inference that increases in hourly rates (awards and penalty rates) led to sharp cuts in hours being worked is inevitable. The much discussed slow-down in the Construction sector would appear to be reflected in declines not only in hours but also rates causing a 4.9% drop in average incomes in the sector.
Accommodation & Food and Manufacturing were the best performers with average incomes rising well above the all-industry average.
The breakdown of industry average incomes, combined with total numbers employed in each industry sector, allow us to analysis the industry sectors’ contribution to total average income growth. Major positive contributions to total average income growth came from Administrative Services (which added 0.8 ppts on the back of a 14.4% y/y increase in incomes), Manufacturing (added 0.3 ppts with incomes +3.9% y/y) and Other Services (also added 0.3 ppts with incomes lifting 7.4% y/y). Construction deducted 0.4 ppts (incomes fell 4.9% y/y) while Professional Services saw incomes drop 5.6% and therefore deducted 0.5 ppts from average income growth.
By using industry employment data from the Conus Industry Employment Trend for the Queensland regions and calculating the relative size of industry employment across sectors and regions, we can estimate the industry sector impact on income changes at a regional level to provide a measure of total average income growth for each SA4. What this analysis shows us is that average incomes in Queensland are estimated to have increased at 1.53% (slower than the national average) with Greater Brisbane at 1.50% and the Rest of Queensland at 1.55%.
| Average Income y/y Dec 2018 | |
| Australia | 1.77 |
| Queensland | 1.53 |
| Greater Brisbane | 1.50 |
| Brisbane – East | 1.34 |
| Brisbane – North | 1.29 |
| Brisbane – South | 1.49 |
| Brisbane – West | 1.25 |
| Brisbane – Inner City | 1.24 |
| Ipswich | 1.82 |
| Logan – Beaudesert | 1.95 |
| Moreton Bay – North | 1.53 |
| Moreton Bay – South | 1.40 |
| Rest of Qld | 1.55 |
| Cairns | 1.77 |
| Darling Downs – Maranoa | 1.46 |
| Fitzroy | 1.59 |
| Gold Coast | 1.70 |
| Mackay | 1.57 |
| Qld – Outback | 0.82 |
| Sunshine Coast | 1.28 |
| Toowoomba | 1.16 |
| Townsville | 1.94 |
| Wide Bay | 1.43 |
Cairns likewise did a little better than the Queensland average due to the under-representation of Professional Services offset by lower Administrative Services numbers.Townsville has performed particularly well (+1.94%) mainly due to relative under-representation in the Construction and Professional Services sectors where average incomes fell (this is a flip side of the substantial decline in Construction employment in the region as building approvals have fallen sharply…see today’s Building Approvals data for details). This was partially offset by a similar under-representation in the Administrative Services sector where incomes rose strongly (+14.4%).
An over-representation of the Professional Services sector in Brisbane’s Inner City accounts for the fact that this region was one of the worst performing in the State.
Toowoomba did worse than average due to high representation in the weak Construction sector and lower numbers in the strong Administrative Services sector.
{The Labour Account average income data is for quarters ending in March, June, Sept and Dec whereas the Labour Force Detailed Quarterly is for quarters ending in Feb, May, Aug and Nov. Nevertheless, the difference in relative employment representation (particularly when seen on a Trend basis) is likely to be minimal.
Actual income data at the regional level is not available. Therefore, the derived changes assume that income changes across industry sectors are common across regions. Differences across regions in average incomes are due to variations in the industry make-up of the employment in those regions.}
The Labour Account also provides us with data on the number of Main and Secondary jobs in the economy. This quarter, for the first time, the number of Secondary jobs moved above 1 million; Secondary jobs now represent 7.2% of all filled jobs in the economy, up from 6.2% six years ago. Main jobs grew at 0.5% for the year while Secondary jobs were up 3.3%.
We are proud to have CBC Staff Selection as supporters of the Conus/CBC Staff Selection Trend Employment and Jobseeker data series