Coronavirus has hit Australia's job market harder than unemployment figures suggest - ABC News

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ANALYSIS: The unemployment figures are some of the the most confusing — and dire — in Australia's history

If those 490,000 persons who dropped out of the labour force last month were still actively looking for work, the number of officially unemployed persons would be nearly half a million higher, at around 1.3 million.Jo Masters, chief economist at EY, says the number of people dropping out of the workforce is a huge concern.

"This data suggest getting people back to jobs will be even more challenging as they will first need to be enticed back into the workforce, and then find a job," she said. The large number of people leaving the workforce has seen the participation rate fall from 66 per cent to 63.5 per cent — the lowest since 2004.The JobKeeper subsidy was designed to keep people officially employed and tied to their employer, even if they have no work to do.But it means the unemployment rate has been kept artificially low, because many people who aren't working are still counted as employed.

That's why the number of "monthly hours worked" is a much better indicator of the state of the labour force than the unemployment rate.According to the latest release, working hours last month fell by a record 163.9 million hours. The previous largest monthly decline was 36 million hours in 2007. "The big decline in hours worked is more reflective of the true deterioration in the labour market to date," said Commonwealth Bank economist Gareth Aird.The decline in hours worked has disproportionately affected working women, who have seen their hours drop by 11.5 per cent, compared to 7.5 per cent for men.Space to play or pause, M to mute, left and right arrows to seek, up and down arrows for volume.

 

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The strategic statisticians have won, they are the only winners here.

So true but what has the parliamentary nobs done to take a pay cut?

You're starting to get it. Now, consider the implications for the Jobseeker support system & the 3rd party contractors that administer it, when unemployment figures are equally improved if a jobseeker finds a job (difficult) or is trapped into non-compliance.

Corona hasn't hit it, SHUTTING THE ECONOMY is what's done it. Now, will we ever know if that was necessary? My money is on it wasn't.

Create a new statistical analysis for the real unemployment rate then. Is a free for all anyway

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