Australian unemployment increased to 1.49 million in March (10.9% of the workforce) with an additional 1.32 million now under-employed as overall employment is down on a year ago

“The latest Roy Morgan employment estimates show that 12,158,000 Australians were employed in March down by a significant 216,000 on a year ago. Once again the fall in employment was driven by a decline in part-time employment by 203,000 to 4,228,000 while full-time employment was down only slightly by 13,000 to 7,930,000.





“Alongside a decline in total employment there were also new entrants to the workforce who have been unable to find jobs which led to a significant increase in unemployment. Unemployment increased by 281,000 to 1,491,000 (10.9% of the workforce) and is now at its highest raw number since just over five years ago in February 2014 (1,561,000 or 12.3%).





“Although unemployment increased on a year ago the relatively small decrease in under-employment from a year ago, which fell 41,000 to 1,321,000 (9.7%), is not surprising when one considers the significant fall in part-time employment.





“The overall result of these changes is a substantial increase in the level of labour under-utilisation in the workforce including both unemployment and under-employment. Now a record high 2,812,000 (20.6% of the workforce) are either unemployed or under-employed. This is the first time over a fifth of the Australian workforce have been looking for work or looking for more work for nearly two years since May 2017.





“The significant slowdown in employment growth in recent months is not surprising when one considers the weak start to 2019 for key indicators. Roy Morgan Business Confidence averaged 106.1 in the March quarter 2019, its lowest quarterly result since September quarter 2011 (103.2).





“The low Business Confidence has been caused by significant uncertainty in large parts of the economy as Australia’s two largest States of NSW and Victoria deal with a slowing housing market as well the uncertainty to businesses caused by an imminent Federal election. In addition to these factors NSW also faced a tight State election in late March.





“Taken together all these factors have clearly impacted on confidence in the broader economy which will not be resolved until Australians have elected a new Government in just over a month’s time. The latest Roy Morgan Poll on Federal voting intention taken after the Federal Budget shows the ALP 52.5% cf. L-NP 47.5% holding a winning two-party preferred lead and set for victory.





“Today’s disappointing employment figures suggest the real problem facing the Morrison Government has been an inability to solve Australia’s continuing problem of high unemployment and under-employment. Roy Morgan has consistently shown over 2 million Australians looking for work (unemployed) or looking for more work (under-employed) since the L-NP Government was first elected in September 2013 and that problem remains a large one to this day.”