Facts & Figures

• Movements in the unemployment rate over the past 20 years are dominated by the recessions of the early-1980s and early-1990s, and the subsequent periods of economic recovery. In trend terms, the unemployment rate peaked at 10.7% in December 1992, then generally fell over the rest of the 1990s, to stand at 6.1% in June 2003.

• Unemployment has generally declined from the levels recorded during the last recession. For the unemployed seeking full-time work, the trend generally reflected the overall impact of the economic cycle. In contrast, over the last two decades or more, the trend for those seeking part-time work, while rising more strongly in the course of a recession, has more generally continued to increase, rising from 89,700 persons (or 12% of unemployed persons) in 1983 to 147,700 persons (or 24% of unemployed persons) in 2003.

• In recent years, the proportion of the unemployed who had experienced unemployment for 26 weeks or less has been rising steadily, while the proportion who experienced unemployment for 52 weeks and over (long-term unemployment) has been in decline. In 2002-03, 64% of unemployed persons had been unemployed for less than 26 weeks, while the long-term unemployed made up 22.1% of unemployment.

• Educational qualifications have a significant bearing on labour market prospects. Of unemployed persons with a bachelor degree or above in July 2002, 15.7% were long-term unemployed, compared to 31.7% of those who had completed Year 10 or below.

• In a July 2002 survey, the most commonly reported main difficulties in finding work were ‘Too many applicants for available jobs’ (14.7% compared with 11.5% in 2001), ‘Considered too young or too old by employers’ (13.4% compared with 11.7% in 2001), ‘Insufficient work experience’ (11.2%, compared with 11.6% in 2001). Those reporting ‘No vacancies at all’ fell from 10.7% of the unemployed in July 2001 to 6.6% in July 2002.

• Jobs growth in Australia over the 1990s was predominantly in part-time and casual employment. Industries that used to employ blue-collar workers have been declining while industries that feature casual employment are on the rise. This means that more jobs are insecure and part-time, and that people who have been employed in a particular industry all their lives find that they are no longer suitable for the work on offer.

• Hidden unemployment has remained stable while ‘official’ unemployment has declined.

• Over the past 22 years while the proportion of the population participating in the labour force has risen by about 3 percentage points to almost 64 per cent, this involves a rise of 11 points to about 56 per cent for women, but a fall of 6 points to 72 per cent for men.

• In May 2003, the youth unemployment rate was 12.3%, compared with an overall unemployment rate of 6.1% for all people. In 1999, the youth unemployment rate was 14%, compared with 7.2% for all people. In both years, the youth unemployment rate was about double the overall rate of unemployment.

• In addition to those young people who were unemployed, another 4% were excluded jobless in 1999. This rose sharply from 2.6% in 1990, although is in fact lower than for the general population.

• In 1999, the mature age unemployment rate was lower at 5.2% than for the general population at 7.2%.

• Hidden joblessness is slightly higher for mature age people than it is for all people. This results in a higher unemployment plus excluded joblessness rate of 14.2% for mature aged people compared with 12.7% for all people.

• Lone mothers are relatively disadvantaged on both measures of unemployment and excluded joblessness. They have both a much higher unemployment rate (9.6%) and a much higher rate of excluded joblessness (21.6%).

• The vast majority of people with disabilities have little or no attachment to the labour force. Of a total of 1,721,000 people with disabilities of workforce age in 1998, approximately half (705,000 people) were neither employed nor actively seeking employment.

• The proportion of Indigenous people of workforce age who were unemployed (23.5%) was more than three times that for the overall population (7.2%).

• The proportion of Indigenous people who were excluded jobless was 18.9%, double the figure of 8.6% for all people.

• Between 1982 and 2002, the proportion of young people in full-time employment decreased _from 40% to 16% for young people aged 15-19 years, and from 65% to 50% for young people aged 20-24 years.

• Between 1988 and 2002, the proportion of young people aged 15-19 years unemployed for more than 52 weeks, fluctuated between 0.9% and 2.7%.

• For young people aged 20-24 years, the proportion who were long-term unemployed ranged between 1.5% and 4.7%.

• Older workers account for nearly a quarter (22.4 per cent) of those who are officially unemployed. The true extent of unemployment among older workers is likely to be higher as many are discouraged job seekers.