The unemployment rate in Australia is not performing to the expectations and hopes for a better new year.
The West Australian Treasurer announced on Tuesday that the unemployment rate increased by 5.8% since last December. Despite this statement, the spokesperson shared with the public a positive outlook on the situation. While Australia is dealing with a difficult situation in this sector, the U.S. overall rate enjoys the best results in over 15 years.
The new unemployment rate comes as unexpected as the job market had gained much power recently. The data from the Bureau of Statistics reveal that there were 9,300 jobs added with full-time status, while the part-time jobs opened 4,200 new positions. This entire total of 13,500 work offers were made public last month only. Despite the increase in job openings, people without a job increased in numbers.
The bureau commented on the rise of part-time jobs within the United States. The job market has been assaulted by too many offers that could provide only half the paying wage. The employment has created a trend in this direction particularly during last year. In the first half of 2016, this new direction had its peak. At this moment, there are 120,900 more people with part-time jobs than there were at the beginning of 2016, and 35,300 fewer jobs that offer a full-time schedule.
Despite the empowered job offers, the unemployment rate increased from 5.7 to 5.8. The reason behind this is that a new wave of people entered the labor market. Thus, the total proportion of people that are active in this sector is now at a percentage of 64.7% which was increased by 0.1% with the arrival of the new wave.
This factor persuaded economists that the current labor market is full of irregularities and has a long way ahead of becoming a strong point for the U.S. One of them, Savanth Sebastian from CommSec, observed that the year of 2016 was able to come up with only 91,500 new jobs. This number is the weakest one for the past four years. Ben Jarman from JP Morgan shares this negative criticism. To his view, the last six to 12 months were proof that the improving trend in this sector that started in late 2015 was completely disrupted.
The unemployment rate at this hour does not reflect good news. Moreover, things can get worse with the construction industry that seems to have reached the end of its booming stage. Economists expect a series of layoffs in this industry.
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