Australia’s unemployment rate has risen to 3.7% in April following a general plateau over the last few months, data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) revealed.
The rise comes as employment dropped by around 4,000 people, with the number of unemployed people increasing by 18,000.
“The small fall in employment followed an average monthly increase of around 39,000 people during the first quarter of this year,” ABS head of labour statistics Bjorn Jarvis said.
Similarly, the employment-to-population ratio fell 0.2 percentage points to 64.2% and the participation rate decreased by 0.1 percentage points to 66.7%.
Even with these falls, Jarvis said, both indicators were still well above pre-COVID-19 pandemic levels and close to their historical highs in 2022.
Meanwhile, monthly hours worked increased by 2.6% in April (seasonally adjusted).
Jarvis said this was because fewer people than usual worked reduced hours over the Easter trading period.
“The last time Easter and the survey period aligned like this was in 2015 when around 60% of employed people worked fewer hours than usual. This Easter it was only around 55% of employed people.
“This may reflect more people taking their leave earlier or later than usual, or that some people were unable to, given the high number of vacancies that we’re still seeing employers reporting.”
Jarvis said the ongoing strength in hours worked over the past six months shows the demand for labour is being met by people working more hours.
The underemployment rate fell by 0.1 of a percentage point to 6.1% (seasonally adjusted), following a 0.4 percentage point increase in March.
"The underemployment rate is still low in historic terms, around 2.6 percentage points lower than before the pandemic, and underpinned by faster growth in hours worked than employment," Jarvis said.
The underutilisation rate - which combines the unemployment and underemployment rates - rose slightly to 9.8% and remained 4.2 percentage points lower than in March 2020.
Underlying trend data
The latest monthly percentage increase in trend employment was slightly higher than the monthly average increase for the 20 years before the pandemic.
"The trend data continues to show how much stronger the growth in hours worked has been, relative to employment,” Jarvis said.
“In trend terms, hours worked increased around 0.4%, which is around double its longer-term average of 0.2% and around double the 0.2% growth rate in employment.”
The trend unemployment rate remained at 3.6% for the third consecutive month, after earlier data was revised up slightly. The trend underemployment rate remained at 6.1% for the fourth straight month.
Meanwhile, the trend participation rate remained steady at 66.7% for the past year, with the trend employment to population ratio falling less than 0.1 percentage point to 64.2%.
“In trend terms, the strong growth in hours worked, the high employment-to-population ratio and participation rate, along with the low unemployment and underemployment rates, all still point to a tight labour market," Jarvis said.