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Five years - 2015 to 2019

For the first time, five years of microdata from the Participation, Job Search and Mobility Survey (PJSM) are available in TableBuilder, covering the period 2015 to 2019.

For comparison purposes, the previous TableBuilder release of 2016 to 2018 microdata also remains available.

For more information see About TableBuilder.


Regular rebenchmarking

From 2018, the PJSM microdata are now rebenchmarked every year to reflect the most recently available release of Estimated Resident Population (ERP) data.

The microdata weights have been revised to incorporate the latest benchmarks. All data from 2015 to 2019 are comparable with estimates published in the March 2019 issue of Labour Force, Australia (cat. no. 6202.0).


Trend factor adjustments

To reduce the impact of seasonal and irregular effects on total employment and unemployment, the benchmarks have been adjusted by factors based on trend Labour Force Survey (LFS) estimates (as published in March 2019).

For example, the unemployment estimates collected in February have a typical seasonal pattern of higher estimates. The factors applied result in a decrease to the estimates for the total number of unemployed to match trend LFS estimates.

From this release, trend factors have also been applied to underemployed benchmarks, also based on the monthly LFS estimates published in March 2019.

For more information refer to the Explanatory Notes (cat. no. 6226.0).


Population Groups

The population groups for 2015 to 2019 have been reconciled to match for the entire period. The definition of population groups provided in the latest Data Item List (available from Downloads) supersede any previously published population groups and obsoletes any previously published concordance tables.

Three new population groups have been added to the list:

• Population 5: Part-time workers who would prefer full-time hours
• Population 16: Persons who left, lost or worked multiple jobs last year
• Population 24: Persons Not in the Labour Force (PNILF) who had a job to go or return to

Population groups that relate to marginal attachment (Populations 23–27) have been updated to include or exclude those who had a job to go or return to. This is consistent with the changes to the marginal attachment framework first published in 2018 (see Key Findings in the 2018 issue of cat. 6226.0)


Skill level of last job

The Australian and New Zealand Standard Classification of Occupations (ANZSCO) is a skill-based classification used to classify all occupations and jobs in the Australian and New Zealand labour markets.

In line with the ANZSCO, occupation data have been grouped by skill level alongside the standard major occupation groups, providing an alternative view on the nature of work.

Under this classification every occupation is assigned a skill level from 1 (high-skilled) to 5 (low-skilled) based on the range and complexity of the particular set of tasks performed in that job.

Data items relating to changes in skill level between the current and previous job are also available. More details are provided in the updated Data Item List, available from Downloads.


Revisions to Industry and Occupation

After a review of the industry and occupation data collected in PJSM since 2015, improvements have been made to the coding of responses relating to the occupation and industry of last job, the job last February, and changes in occupation while working for the same employer.

Subsequently, revisions have been made to the microdata in relation to the the industry and occupation data items. This results in improved industry and occupation estimates compared to the output from the previous microdata release.


Country of Birth

The Country of Birth data item has been updated to match the latest country names published in Standard Australian Classification of Countries (SACC), 2016 (cat. no. 1269.0).

The top 10 most populous countries of birth have also been updated to match the findings from the 2016 Census of Population and Housing. Details of the change is provided in the updated Data Item List, available from Downloads


Relationship in Household

During the quality assurance of the publication Labour Force Status and Other Characteristics of Families (cat. no. 6224.0.55.001), the ABS identified an issue with some family coding which affected a range of key family estimates - particularly during the period 2015 to 2018.

For this reason, data items relating to family characteristics have been removed from this release of PJSM microdata. The data items will be re-instated for the next release in 2020, which will include revised family characteristics for the period 2015-2019.


Townsville

Flooding in Townsville in February 2019 resulted in a major disruption to the operation of the Labour Force Survey (LFS) and the accompanying Participation, Job Search and Mobility Survey (PJSM). As a result, there was a very low sample of responding households in the region in February.

Given the severity of these disruptions, which affected almost the entire region, and to ensure that this loss of sample did not affect estimates for Australia and Queensland, the ABS imputed sample in Townsville for February 2019. The imputation drew upon previous information that had been collected from people in Townsville and matches the similarly imputed estimates published in LFS for February 2019.

When producing tables with geographic data, it should be noted that estimates for the Townsville region (SA4 318) are imputed in 2019 and are unlikely to be representative of the labour market at the time of the flood. Aggregated estimates for Rest of Queensland (GCCSA 3RQLD), Queensland (STT 3) and Australia in 2019 will also be marginally affected.