REVISIONS TO MONTHLY HOURS WORKED IN ALL JOBS

Since 2009, the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) has produced modelled estimates of monthly hours worked for all jobs.

Each year, as part of the modelling approach, the monthly hours worked in all jobs series is ‘benchmarked’ to a new annual hours worked estimate, per the below diagram.

For this annual cycle the ABS has undertaken a more fundamental assessment of the components of this modelling, as part of an enhanced quality assurance process. This process identified some legacy public and school holiday profiles in the calculation of previous benchmarks, resulting in revisions in the number of monthly hours worked in all jobs series.

Revised modelled estimates can be found in Table 19 and Table 21. The following graph shows the effect of the revisions, which mainly reflect a shift in the level of the series by around 1 per cent since 2012-13, while the recently observed growth is largely unchanged.

Productivity statistics are revised each year, following the annual benchmarking of monthly hours worked in all jobs and revisions to other inputs. Information on the impact of these latest revisions will be included in Estimates of Industry Multifactor Productivity, 2015-16 (cat. no. 5260.0.55.002), when it is released in late 2016. The increase in the level of hours worked will reduce the level of labour productivity in recent years, but have a minimal effect on recent productivity growth.

The ABS is continuing to explore a small number of improvements to the monthly hours worked in all jobs methodology, which may result in minor revisions to the data in future years. Further information on these will be published in Labour Force, Australia (cat. no. 6202.0), in advance of any changes being made.