The unemployment rate in Australia has fallen surprisingly to 4.9 per cent, its lowest level in a year, and the ACT has strengthened its economic credentials ahead of deep public sector job cuts next fiscal year.
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The national jobless rate dropped to 4.9 per cent in April, seasonally adjusted, from 5.2 per cent in the previous month, the Australian Bureau of Statistics said today.
Thanks to a decline in the number of people looking for work and a sharp jump in part-time work, the result beat market forecasts, which had tipped the jobless rate to nudge up to 5.3 per cent.
Total employment rose 15,500 in April, with a gain of 26,000 part-time jobs offsetting a 10,500 decline in full-time jobs.
St George Bank chief economist Hans Kunnen said the data indicated Australia’s employers favoured more flexible working arrangements, particularly given the uncertainty over Europe’s debt woes.
“You would prefer full-time jobs, but part-time jobs reflect the current conditions and the need for flexibility,” Mr Kunnen told The Canberra Times.
For the territory, the unemployment rate fell to 3.3 per cent in April, in trend terms, from 3.4 per cent in the previous month, and the lowest level since December 2010.
The decline in the territory's unemployment rate will be welcome news for the ACT, which is bracing for cuts in federal spending and jobs in 2012-13 after Tuesday's budget was handed down.
A total of about 4000 jobs, when military recruitment is excluded, are being chopped from the federal bureaucracy nationally in 2012-13.
It is estimated that 1600 of those jobs losses will be in Canberra because just under 40 per cent of the bureaucracy is based in the nation's capital.
