MAY KEY FIGURES

		Apr 2014	May 2014	Apr 14 to May 14		May 13 to May 14
Trend
	Employed persons ('000)	11 560.0	11 573.1	13.1		0.9	%
	Unemployed persons ('000)	721.9	719.7	-2.2		5.2	%
	Unemployment rate (%)	5.9	5.9	0.0	pts	0.2	pts
	Participation rate (%)	64.7	64.7	0.0	pts	-0.4	pts
Seasonally Adjusted
	Employed persons ('000)	11 569.4	11 564.6	-4.8		0.9	%
	Unemployed persons ('000)	713.9	717.1	3.2		6.5	%
	Unemployment rate (%)	5.8	5.8	0.0	pts	0.3	pts
	Participation rate (%)	64.7	64.6	-0.1	pts	-0.4	pts

Employed Persons

Unemployment Rate

MAY KEY POINTS


TREND ESTIMATES (MONTHLY CHANGE)

• Employment increased to 11,573,100.
• Unemployment decreased to 719,700.
• Unemployment rate remained steady at 5.9%.
• Participation rate remained steady at 64.7%.
• Aggregate monthly hours worked decreased 2.1 million hours (0.1%) to 1,598.6 million hours.

SEASONALLY ADJUSTED ESTIMATES (MONTHLY CHANGE)

• Employment decreased 4,800 to 11,564,600. Full-time employment increased 22,200 to 8,068,300 and part-time employment decreased 27,000 to 3,496,200.
• Unemployment increased 3,200 to 717,100. The number of unemployed persons looking for full-time work increased 9,000 to 529,700 and the number of unemployed persons only looking for part-time work decreased 5,900 to 187,400.
• The unemployment rate was unchanged at 5.8%.
• Participation rate decreased 0.1 pts to 64.6%.
• Aggregate monthly hours worked increased 26.5 million hours (1.7%) to 1 ,604.5 million hours.

LABOUR UNDERUTILISATION (QUARTERLY CHANGE)

• Trend estimates: The labour force underutilisation rate remained steady at 13.5%.
• Seasonally adjusted estimates: The labour force underutilisation rate was 13.5%. The male labour force underutilisation rate remained steady at 11.5%. The female labour force underutilisation rate increased by less than 0.1 pts to 15.9%.

NOTES

FORTHCOMING ISSUES

ISSUE	Release Date
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
November 2014	11 December 2014

WHAT'S NEW IN THE LABOUR FORCE

For information on forthcoming changes to Labour Force outputs and revision to active job search steps, refer to 'What's New in the Labour Force' on pages 5-6.


ROUNDING

Estimates of monthly and quarterly changes shown on the front cover and used in the commentary have been calculated using unrounded estimates, and may be different from, but are more accurate than, movements obtained from the rounded estimates. The graphs on the front cover also depict unrounded estimates.


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 APRIL 2014 AND MAY 2014
	Monthly change	95% Confidence interval
Total Employment	-4 800	-62 200	to	52 600
Total Unemployment	3 200	-34 000	to	40 400
Unemployment rate	0.0 pts	-0.4 pts	to	0.4 pts
Participation rate	-0.1 pts	-0.5 pts	to	0.3 pts

INQUIRIES

For further information about these and related statistics, contact the National Information and Referral Service on 1300 135 070, email client.services@abs.gov.au or Labour Force on Canberra (02) 6252 6525, email labourforce@abs.gov.au. The ABS Privacy Policy outlines how the ABS will handle any personal information that you provide to us.