MEDIA RELEASE
27 August 2014	Embargoed: 11.30 am (Canberra time)	124/2014

If Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people had the same levels of education as non-Indigenous people, the gap in labour force participation would decrease by half, according to an article in Australian Social Trends, released today by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS).

"While health and remoteness have some effect, we found that for Aboriginal or Torres Strait Islander people, education was the single largest contributor to being in the labour market," said Graeme Brown from the ABS.

“We found that when there were similar education, health and geographic characteristics for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people as for non-Indigenous people, the gap in labour force participation dropped by two-thirds, falling from 19.9 to 6.3 percentage points."

“However, even with factors that affect labour force outcomes being the same, Aboriginal and Torres Strait islander people were still twice as likely as non-Indigenous people to be unemployed - 10.8 per cent compared with 5.5 per cent,” Mr Brown said.

More details are in today's Australian Social Trends (4102.0), available for free download from www.abs.gov.au. Further Australian Social Trends articles are also available online.

Media Notes:

• When reporting ABS data, the Australian Bureau of Statistics (or ABS) must be attributed as the source.
• Media request and interviews - contact the ABS Communications Section on 1300 175 070.