Australian Employment Report for January from the Australian Bureau of Statistics

Employment Change: +13.5K ... headline beat (but check out the huge fall in 'full time')

  • expected 10.0K, prior 16.3K, revised from 13.5K

Unemployment Rate: 5.7%

  • expected 5.8%, prior 5.8%
  • BEAT ... but how much is discouraged workers withdrawing from the labour force? Participation rate fell, & over the last 12 months the trend employment to population ratio fell. On the plus side trend hours worked in the month are higher ... this is a positive in that it could well foreshadow further employment gains.

Full Time Employment Change -44.8K

  • prior was +11.3K, revised from +9.3K

Part Time Employment Change +58.3K

  • prior was +5.1K, revised up from +4.2K

Participation Rate 64.6%

  • expected is 64.7%, prior was 64.7%

'Trend' data

The above is the 'seasonally adjusted' data, which is the initial market focus. The ABS does tell us to look at the 'trend' data, though. I highlight this every month, and doing so again:

  • Total trend employment increased by 11,700 persons in January 2017, reflecting an increase in both full-time (up 6,500) and part-time (up 5,100) employment
  • Monthly trend full-time employment increased by 6,500 ... the fourth consecutive month of increasing full-time employment, after eight consecutive decreases earlier in 2016
  • Total employment growth over the year was 0.8 per cent, which was less than half the average growth rate over the past 20 years (1.8%)
  • Trend unemployment rate was 5.7 per cent for the ninth consecutive month
  • The trend participation rate was unchanged at 64.6 per cent
  • The trend monthly hours worked increased by 3.6 million hours (0.2 per cent), with increases in total hours worked by both full-time workers and part-time workers.
  • The employment to population ratio remaining steady at 60.9 per cent.

More on the trend data:

  • Over the past 12 months, trend employment increased by 89,700 (or 0.8 per cent), which is less than half of the average year-on-year growth over the past 20 years (1.8 per cent)
  • Over the same 12 month period the trend employment to population ratio, which is a measure of how employed the population over 15 years is, decreased by 0.4 percentage points to 60.9 per cent.

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I've been asked in the comment fro the key takeaway from this data.

Yes, we have employment growth. its too slow.

This has been the case for over a year. And it continues.

The RBA will not be comfortable with this labour market data, there is still strong evidence of too much 'slack' for their liking.

The RBA is on hold for the time being, but they will not be overly happy with labour data.