Annual growth in employment

Strong employment growth

Employment has grown very strongly over the past year, with over 230,000 jobs created. The unemployment rate has fallen substantially to around 6 per cent. Next year, further jobs should be created and the unemployment rate should remain steady at around current low levels.

Solid labour market

Employment has grown very strongly over the past year, with more than 230,000 new jobs created.

This increase is despite the large job losses in rural and regional Australia due to the drought. About 80,000 jobs in the farm sector were lost over the past year because of the drought.

Employment growth has been particularly strong in the construction and retail sectors. Almost 60,000 new construction jobs and 70,000 new retail jobs were created in the year to March 2003.

Since March 1996, more than 1 million new jobs have been created.

Employment growth is likely to slow a little next year, although rural and regional employment should start to pick up if the drought breaks.

The unemployment rate is expected to remain steady at around recent lows of 6 per cent. This is around 2 percentage points lower than it was when the Government came into office in 1996.

Australia's unemployment rate is currently almost 1 percentage point lower than that of the OECD. This is a good outcome given the difficult circumstances that we have faced.

With solid productivity growth and moderate wage pressures, the economy is well placed to deliver jobs growth in the future. Further structural reforms would help deliver further sustained reductions in unemployment and higher workforce participation.