But the fund's analysts – who also call for renewed efforts to boost skill levels and education – suggest jobless rates may need to fall below levels normally considered "full employment" before shortages of workers stoke wages growth.

In Australia, where unemployment has been stuck around 5.5 per cent for much of the past year, that level is just below 5 per cent, according to the Reserve Bank. In the lead up to the 2008 financial crisis – when inflation was accelerating – the jobless rate was around 4 per cent.

"Wage growth is...unlikely to pick up until [labour market] slack diminishes meaningfully – an outcome that requires continued accommodative policies to boost aggregate demand," the report's authors said.

Even in countries where unemployment has fallen below their pre-crisis levels, such as Germany, Japan, the US and UK, slow productivity growth accounts for about two-thirds of the slowdown in nominal wages growth since 2007, they said.

Wages growth – or rather the lack of it – remains one of the most politically charged issues in today's economy. It has led to Labor leader Bill Shorten flagging plans to meet ACTU demands for a dramatic lift in the minimum wage.

Business groups have warned that without a lift in productivity, such actions will end up crunching jobs growth.

Saul Eslake, an independent economist, said the IMF report provides one of the most coherent explanations available for the apparent disconnect between wages growth and unemployment rates in advanced economies.

"We are one of those countries where unemployment is still above their pre-crisis average, so it should be no surprise that wages growth is still sluggish here," Mr Eslake said.


"And that it is likely to remain so until unemployment is at least down to, if not below, its pre-crisis average and 'under-utilisation' has also declined a lot.

"And even if we do get to that point, wages growth will remain sluggish if productivity growth doesn't improve."

The IMF's study crunched data for 21 economic sectors across 31 advanced economies since 2000.

The team said that changes in workplace laws linked to individual or collective dismissals – a measure of employment protection – "do not have a statistically significant effect on nominal wage growth".