APRIL KEY FIGURES

		Mar 2014	Apr 2014	Mar 14 to Apr 14		Apr 13 to Apr 14
Trend
	Employed persons ('000)	11 544.2	11 561.4	17.2		0.8	%
	Unemployed persons ('000)	724.8	723.8	-1.0		6.9	%
	Unemployment rate (%)	5.9	5.9	0.0	pts	0.3	pts
	Participation rate (%)	64.7	64.8	0.0	pts	-0.4	pts
Seasonally Adjusted
	Employed persons ('000)	11 558.7	11 572.9	14.2		0.9	%
	Unemployed persons ('000)	713.8	713.4	-0.4		5.1	%
	Unemployment rate (%)	5.8	5.8	0.0	pts	0.2	pts
	Participation rate (%)	64.8	64.7	0.0	pts	-0.4	pts

Employed Persons

Unemployment Rate

APRIL KEY POINTS


TREND ESTIMATES (MONTHLY CHANGE)

• Employment increased to 11,561,400.
• Unemployment decreased to 723,800.
• Unemployment rate remained steady at 5.9%.
• Participation rate increased by less than 0.1 pts to 64.8%, based on unrounded estimates.
• Aggregate monthly hours worked decreased 4.2 million hours (0.3%) to 1,595.7 million hours.

SEASONALLY ADJUSTED ESTIMATES (MONTHLY CHANGE)

• Employment increased 14,200 (0.1%) to 11,572,900. Full-time employment increased 14,200 to 8,045,100 and part-time employment was unchanged.
• Unemployment decreased 400 to 713,400. The number of unemployed persons looking for full-time work increased 8,700 to 519,500 and the number of unemployed persons only looking for part-time work decreased 9,000 to 193,900.
• The unemployment rate was unchanged at 5.8%.
• Participation rate decreased by less than 0.1 pts to 64.7%, based on unrounded estimates.
• Aggregate monthly hours worked decreased 39.9 million hours (2.5%) to 1,572.6 million hours.

NOTES

FORTHCOMING ISSUES

ISSUE	Release Date
May 2014	12 June 2014
June 2014	10 July 2014
July 2014	7 August 2014
August 2014	11 September 2014
September 2014	9 October 2014
October 2014	6 November 2014

ABOUT THE DATA

Seasonal adjustment attempts to remove all systematic and calendar related events from the original time series. In general, calendar related events affecting the original series are stable with respect to time, with one notable exception being the Easter holidays. Special corrections are applied for events such as Easter which are considered 'moving holidays', and these are applied to Labour Force series, in particular the aggregate monthly hours worked series.

For the aggregate monthly hours worked series, in addition to the correction factors for Easter, corrections were also applied to account for the timing of various school holidays across different states in Australia. Corrections were not applied to take into account the unusually close proximity of the timing of ANZAC day and Easter holidays in April 2014. Due to the rarity of this event, there is insufficient information to accurately estimate and correct for it. This proximity effect, combined with the timing of Easter and school holidays, may have contributed to the decrease in seasonally adjusted aggregate monthly hours worked during April 2014.


SAMPLING ERROR

The estimates in this publication are based on a sample survey. Published estimates and the movements derived from them are subject to sampling variability. Standard errors give a measure of sampling variability (see Standard Errors section). The interval bounded by two standard errors is the 95% confidence interval, which provides a way of looking at the variability inherent in estimates. There is a 95% chance that the true value of the estimate lies within that interval.

MOVEMENTS IN SEASONALLY ADJUSTED SERIES BETWEEN MARCH 2014 AND APRIL 2014
	Monthly change	95% Confidence interval
Total Employment	14 200	-43 200	to	71 600
Total Unemployment	-400	-38 800	to	38 000
Unemployment rate	0.0 pts	-0.4 pts	to	0.4 pts
Participation rate	0.0 pts	-0.4 pts	to	0.4 pts

INQUIRIES

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