Australia had an unexpected contraction in employment in December, with a decrease of -65.1k jobs, significantly deviating from expectation of 15.4k. This decline was marked by a substantial drop in full-time employment by -106.6k, which was only partially offset by 41.4k increase in part-time jobs.
Despite this downturn in job creation, unemployment rate remained steady at 3.9%, aligning with expectations. Participation rate declined -0.4% to 66.8%. Additionally, there was -0.5% mom decrease in the total monthly hours worked.
David Taylor, ABS head of labour statistics, noted combined strong growth of 117k in October and November, and the fall in large contraction in December, “reflected changes in the timing of employment growth in the last few months of 2023, compared with earlier years.”
Over the past twelve months, employment grew an average of 32k. Also, both the unemployment and underemployment rates remained relatively low and the participation rate and employment-to-population ratio relatively high. Taylor noted that suggests “the labour market remains tight.”
