Hidden’ jobless take rate above 6.3pc and rising

    The Australian
    July 05, 2014


LABOUR-market analysts have warned of a huge rise in “hidden” unemployment, with new research showing men are the big losers in the job stakes in a rapidly changing economy.

A study by former ALP senator John Black’s research group Australian Development Strategies estimates that, in the past, between 60,000 and 75,000 men joined the hidden unemployed, representing about 1 per cent of the male workforce or 0.5 per cent of the total workforce.      

In an article in The Weekend Australian, Mr Black writes that had these figures been taken into account they would have pushed the unemployment rate to 6.3 per cent for the end of May.

“At the moment, the blokes are living off the wives,” Mr Black said yesterday. Women had taken a disproportionate share of jobs in growth industries, such as real estate and the federal public service, which had expanded under Labor.

But Mr Black said these public-service jobs were also now contracting as the Coalition tightened federal spending, while reduced industry protection would result in more losses in manufacturing and other blue-collar industries.      

The conclusion was supported by University of Newcastle ­labour-market economist Bill Mitchell, who told The Weekend Australian that, in the past four years since the easing of the global financial crisis, 220,000 hidden unemployed had joined the jobless ranks.      

If they were included in the ­official unemployment statistics, the headline unemployment rate would be 7.6 per cent, he said.

In addition, underemployment had risen. “I think the official unemployment rate is going to rise and if you add in the hidden unemployment and underemployment you come to 13.7 per cent in total, and that is going to rise to 14.5 per cent, no worries,” Professor Mitchell said.

Many economists think that the ­official labour-market survey conducted by the Australian ­Bureau of Statistics according to an international measure pro­duces a very restricted unemployment figure because it includes only those who say they actively looked for work in the past week.

The hidden unemployed, who do not show up in the ABS figures, include those seeking work, but who had not actively done so in the particular week the ABS surveyed them, those who had only just lost their jobs and were yet to seriously look for new ones, and those who wanted a job but had given up trying because of ­repeated knock-backs.      

The Roy Morgan Research Centre has just released its June employment survey, which found an estimated 1.326 million Australians or 10.6 per cent of the workforce were unemployed, up 0.9 per cent from the previous month and 0.9 per cent on the corresponding period last year.

The survey simply asks people if they are unemployed and, in a general sense, want to work.

“Analysing long-term trends shows Australian unemployment has risen in June in each of the last four years,” the centre said.

Among those with jobs, 1.188 million — 9.5 per cent of the workforce — were under­employed, working part-time and seeking more work, the survey found. This was the highest the Morgan survey has recorded, up 1.4 per cent from a month ago and up 0.3 per cent compared with the corresponding period last year.

A study by a former ALP hack while a Coalition govt is in office? Your credibility went out the window in the first paragraph!!!

Women are better social networkers and are less likely to be assertive about their rights than men; they will end up with all the casual jobs in the future. Once principles of meritocracy and fairness go out the window, as they have been in the past few decades; honest men can only be the losers. There will be no place in the world for those who refuse to stroke the ego's of others.

Life_goes_on wrote on Jul 5^th, 2014 at 7:24am:


The problem started 30+ years ago and has accelerated since.  It started with the influx of 40% more available full-time workers into the workforce, who were then, as quite clearly shown in Professor Mitchell's commentary, shoehorned via affirmative action and an amended education system into the good and easy work, leaving others to pick up the dregs.  The dregs, of well-enough paid manual work etc, are rapidly declining in this country, and are being shared around in any case, leaving precious little for one specific and deliberately delineated demographic.

I have been a long-time campaigner against affirmative action and alterations to education standards and all the other things, prejudice for the well-groomed and the pretty etc, demands for 'equal treatment' that left far too many out in the cold while focusing on specific social groups, direct campaigns against the long-standing members of the workforce to 'bring them into line with acceptable standards', and so forth, that have created a workplace and workforce nightmare for Australia.

The proof of the validity of my stance against these things is here and now - this country is on its knees in reality and we are enduring the spectre of a form of government of both sides, fed by its apparent success in suppressing opposition to its ideological moves, that thinks it can simply dictate what it wants without let or hindrance from the people.

I warned many years ago that the introduction of discriminatory work and placement practices returned an unwarranted level of control to government and employer, and was open to blatant abuse.  This has come to pass.. you need only look at 'industrial relations' and so forth now, and what actual Rights the ordinary person holds these days.

Tomorrow is going to be worse.

Grappler Truth Teller Feller wrote on Jul 5^th, 2014 at 1:19pm:

Sorry, you're wrong. It has been proven scientifically, their brains are wired that way. The fact that they're not as adept these days has more to do with the loss of the extended family and the consequent lack of early training and experience than anything else. Any parent of both genders or experienced teacher will tell you that. 

As long as people who have given up looking for work but want it...  and people who work 1 hour per week are considered employed or not relative to the unemployment figures they will never be accurate.