How achievable is the LNP 4% unemployment target?

Before the previous state election the LNP’s Economic Blueprint for Queensland committed the new state government to achieving an unemployment rate of 4% in six years (not in this first term, as some seem to be be assuming). With unemployment currently running at 6.7%, and trending higher, what are the chances …read more

Aussie jobs surprise

After the shock of a weak jobs report last month (see here), the data for August has come in so strong that it’s almost beyond belief. The headline seasonally adjusted unemployment rate has fallen to 6.1% from 6.4% in July with a massive 121,000 new jobs in the month. The …read more

More bad tourism news for Queensland

The release by Tourism Research Australia today of the National Visitor Survey for the second quarter 2014 (available here) is yet more bad news for Queensland. Nationwide domestic overnight visits were up 5.1% from a year ago (although expenditure only increased by 3.6%..barely keeping pace with inflation), but to Queensland …read more

What the Chinese living in Australia think of Queensland

An interesting report from Tourism Research Australia on Chinese Resident Perceptions of Queensland was released yesterday. Loose Change has a handy precis of the main finding on his post. What we found rather interesting, and a little strange, was that the #1 “preferred holiday destination in Queensland” for Chinese resident …read more

Departures nudging 9 million in past 12 months

The ABS Short Term Arrivals and Departures data today shows total (seasonally adjusted) departures for the 12 months to July 2014 hitting a new record which just missed breaching the 9 million barrier (actually 8,987,100). July saw a total of 763,800 departures which was up 4.3% from a year ago. Arrivals …read more

International tourists in TNQ

Yesterday saw the release of Tourism Research Australia’s International Visitor Survey for the second quarter of 2014. We covered some of the detail yesterday (see here). TRA have opted to cease producing some data for public release; this includes the breakdown of visitors to regions by their country of origin. …read more

The CONUS Quarterly now available for download

The September issue of The CONUS Quarterly is now available for download. You can find it on the Reports page of our website, or by simply clicking Conus Quarterly September 2014. If you would like to receive the Quarterly by email every three months please just sign up for our …read more

GDP +0.5%/+3.1% hits expectations

The second quarter GDP release this morning has come in bang-on expectations with a 0.5% increase for the quarter, giving us a (slightly below trend) growth of 3.1% for the year. Some of the data previously released for the quarter had pointed towards the possibility of a weaker print, so …read more

Intl Tourism data is good for Australia but bad for QLD

The latest International Visitors Survey from Tourism Research Australia (available here) shows international tourist numbers hit a new high in the year to June 2014 at 6.147 million, a rise of 7.6% from a year ago. Arrivals from China led the charge, up 10.5% to 708,000, but the US also …read more

Solid start to the year for Building Approvals

ABS data this morning for Building Approvals in July beat market expectations. Seasonally adjusted approvals were up 2.5% for the month (against expectations around +1.7%) for a 9.4% increase on the year. The bulk of the increase came from the highly volatile units sector, with housing approvals up by just …read more

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