It’s a reminder that the “records” politicians like to talk about are often much less impressive than they sound. When you have a growing population like ours you need be hitting record levels all the time just to keep up – that goes for jobs as well as spending on things like infrastructure and social services. Illustration: Simon Letch The actual number of Australians out of work hasn’t shifted all that much. Over the past year the total number unemployed has edged down from about 739,000 to 730,000 (in trend terms). It is strange how little attention is given to that figure.

These days, politicians don’t talk much about unemployment. When I searched the flurry of transcripts for media interviews and speeches done by Malcolm Turnbull and Bill Shorten so far this month the words "unemployment" or “unemployed” never appeared. And it's not just politicians – journalists don’t often ask about unemployment. Somehow those 730,000 Australians without a job seem to have slipped down the political agenda. That’s a pity because there are some worrying trends buried in the unemployment numbers.

The latest trend figures showed 94,000 Australians have been out of work for two years or more, the highest in 18 years. Also, there has been a sustained rise in the share of jobless Australians who are experiencing long-term unemployment – those who are out of work for 12 months or more. In early 2009, just before the economy felt the effects of the global financial crisis, one in eight jobless Australians had been unemployed for a year or more. Now that share has risen to about one in every four. There’s significant human cost behind these statistics because unemployment is much more than an economic issue. Many studies have drawn attention to the misery and unhappiness associated with being out of work.

Long-term unemployment is especially damaging. The Fairfax-Lateral Economics Wellbeing Index estimates the economic cost of long-term unemployment was $13.6 billion last year. Even so, these thorny challenges exposed each month in our official jobs figures rarely figure in political debate. With global growth the strongest it has been in sometime Australia is lagging many advanced country counterparts when it comes to unemployment. The United States (4.1 per cent) Britain (4.3), New Zealand (4.5) and Germany (3.6) all have unemployment rates well below ours.

We know the Australian economy can produce much lower rates of unemployment. The trend rate of unemployment was 4.5 per cent or lower for most of 2007 and 2008, prior to the global financial crisis. One key figure who does still talk a lot about unemployment is the Reserve Bank Governor, Philip Lowe. One of the bank’s mandates is “the maintenance of full employment in Australia.” In a speech last week he admitted we are some way off that goal. “It is still some time before we are likely to be at conventional estimates of full employment,” he said.

Lowe also warned that further progress in lowering unemployment “is expected to be only gradual”. The traditional way to drive unemployment lower has been for the Reserve Bank to stimulate economic activity and demand for jobs by cutting interest rates. But Lowe has made it clear he does not want to encourage any more borrowing. With interest rates at a historic low and household debt at an all-time high he has argued the risks of further cuts are too high. Lowe says it is more likely that the next move in official rates “will be up, not down”. The other option is for the budget to be more supportive of jobs growth.

The federal government's lift to infrastructure spending during the past year or so will help. The International Monetary Fund’s recent assessment of the Australian economy welcomed a “more supportive fiscal policy stance” from an “infrastructure boost”. But recent budget papers suggest no clear government strategy to drive the jobless rate back below 5 per cent in the short term. The latest budget forecasts in December showed unemployment edging down from its current rate of 5.5 per cent to 5.25 per cent during next financial year and staying there until mid-2021. In 1993 the former Treasury secretary Ted Evans made the challenging observation that, given the range of policy options available to governments, Australia could “choose the level of unemployment we are willing to bear”.