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SA unemployment rate falls, along with full-time job numbers

South Australia’s jobless rate has fallen by a full percentage point to 7.1 per cent, shrugging the tag of Australia’s highest unemployment state in the process.

Oct 15, 2020, updated Oct 15, 2020
Photo: Tony Lewis/InDaily

Photo: Tony Lewis/InDaily

September’s jobs figures were released this morning, revealing a slight rise in the seasonally adjusted national unemployment rate from 6.8 per cent in August to 6.9 per cent.

Surprisingly, pandemic-hit Victoria’s unemployment rate fell from 7.1 per cent in August to 6.7 per cent despite a 35,000 fall in the number of people with a job, which was offset by a 1 per cent fall in the participation rate.

Queensland now has Australia’s worst unemployment rate at 7.7 per cent, followed by Tasmania (7.6 per cent) and New South Wales (7.2 per cent).

The number of South Australians with a job increased by 8,700 in September but the number of people with full-time employment fell by 1500.

The seasonally adjusted participation rate, which measures the proportion of the working-age population either in work or looking for a job, was steady at 62.5 per cent.

Nationally, the participation decreased to 64.8 per cent and the number of people in employment fell to 12,571,900.

The monthly underemployment rate increased slightly to 11.4 per cent.

Innovation and Skills Minister David Pisoni said 36,000 more South Australians had found work in the past four months, while maintaining and growing employment was the state government’s top priority.

“We are doing everything in our power to ensure as many local jobs as possible survive through the greatest economic challenge of our time, which is why we’ve committed $2 billion in economic stimulus measures, including significant payroll tax and land tax relief,” he said.

Pisoni said the government had also given $10,000 emergency cash grants to more than 18,000 business and not-for-profit organisations, and was rolling out $12b in infrastructure spending over four years.

 

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