The Mid-Year Fiscal and Economic Review released this afternoon (download here) will have made happy reading for QLD Treasurer Curtis Pitt. Surging coal royalties have resulted in a better than expected surplus and allowed the government to “splash some cash” ahead of a probable election next year. Although the fiscal …read more
The release by the Dept of Employment of their Small Area Labour Market (SALM) data for the third quarter to Sept 2016 confirms the weaker story that we’ve been seeing in Townsville. The SALM data is based on a range of indicators including ABS Labour Force data for the SA4 areas, …read more
Our own Conus Trend series for Cairns SA4, based on the original ABS regional data, showed a reduction in Trend unemployment in October to 7.3%. The Dept of Social Security payment recipients data released on Weds appears somewhat less positive. Although recipient numbers fell the Conus Trend series showed a …read more
The release today by the ABS of their original, unadjusted regional labour force data allows us to update our own Conus Trend series. What we see is (again) confirmation of the improving story in Cairns but, unfortunately, a reversal of the brighter picture for Townsville that we noted (and questioned!) …read more
Kier Shorey from ABC Far North spoke to Pete this morning about yesterday’s labour force data for Queensland (you can read yesterday’s commentary below). Later in the morning Kier also spoke to QLD Treasurer Curtis Pitt and I was struck by Pitt’s contention that the Participation Rate “goes up and …read more
Today’s ABS Labour Force data for October is, on the face of it, reasonable. However, when we dig deeper we see a significantly weaker picture. The headline (seasonally adjusted) unemployment rate in Australia remained stable at 5.6% (mkt expected 5.7%) and we saw an additional 9,800 jobs added. However, we …read more
Data released by the ABS today for the Sept 2016 quarter shows wages growth across the economy in Australia was +2.0% for the year. Private sector growth stood at +1.9% while the Public sector did better at 2.3%. (all figures relate to ABS original series to allow for comparison to …read more
For some time we have been working to expand our Conus Trend Regional Jobs database and are pleased to announce that we now have our full Conus Trend data available for NSW and Victoria to add to our previous QLD data. Following future ABS Regional Labour Force data releases we …read more
Pete was on Radio 4CA this morning talking to John MacKenzie about the latest release of the Conus Trend Regional Jobs data. Listen below…
Following on from the Sept Conus Trend Regional QLD labour force data there has been some discussion among readers (and on Twitter) regarding the impact of the Gold and Sunshine Coast changes in employment on the noted divergence between Greater Brisbane and Rest of Queensland full time positions (see the …read more