OCTOBER KEY FIGURES

		Sep 2015	Oct 2015	Sep 15 to Oct 15	Oct 14 to Oct 15
Trend
	Employed persons ('000)	11 796.6	11 815.4	18.8	2.3 %
	Unemployed persons ('000)	768.0	764.9	-3.1	-0.4 %
	Unemployment rate (%)	6.1	6.1	0.0 pts	-0.2 pts
	Participation rate (%)	65.0	65.0	0.0 pts	0.4 pts
Seasonally Adjusted
	Employed persons ('000)	11 779.6	11 838.2	58.6	2.7 %
	Unemployed persons ('000)	772.9	739.5	-33.4	-4.3 %
	Unemployment rate (%)	6.2	5.9	-0.3 pts	-0.4 pts
	Participation rate (%)	64.9	65.0	0.1 pts	0.5 pts

Employed Persons

Unemployment Rate

OCTOBER KEY POINTS


TREND ESTIMATES (MONTHLY CHANGE)

• Employment increased to 11,815,400.
• Unemployment decreased to 764,900.
• Unemployment rate remained steady at 6.1%.
• Participation rate remained steady at 65.0%.
• Monthly hours worked in all jobs increased 5.7 million hours to 1,647.1 million hours.

SEASONALLY ADJUSTED ESTIMATES (MONTHLY CHANGE)

• Employment increased 58,600 to 11,838,200. Full-time employment increased 40,000 to 8,171,600 and part-time employment increased 18,600 to 3,666,600.
• Unemployment decreased 33,400 to 739,500. The number of unemployed persons looking for full-time work decreased 30,300 to 526,300 and the number of unemployed persons only looking for part-time work decreased 3,100 to 213,200.
• Unemployment rate decreased 0.3 pts to 5.9%.
• Participation rate increased 0.1 pts to 65.0%.
• Monthly hours worked in all jobs increased 19.1 million hours (1.2%) to 1,660.4 million hours.

NOTES

FORTHCOMING ISSUES

ISSUE	Release Date
November 2015	10 December 2015
December 2015	14 January 2016
January 2016	18 February 2016
February 2016	17 March 2016
March 2016	14 April 2016
April 2016	19 May 2016

WHAT'S NEW IN THE LABOUR FORCE

For details regarding an update to the Labour Force Survey questionnaire from December 2015 and the publication of quarterly rebenchmarked estimates, refer to "What's new in the Labour Force".


ROUNDING

Estimates of 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, movement 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 movements are subject to sampling variability. Standard errors give a measure of sampling variability. 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 SEPTEMBER 2015 AND OCTOBER 2015
	Monthly change	95% Confidence interval
Total Employment	58 600	400	to	116 800
Total Unemployment	-33 400	-71 600	to	4 800
Unemployment rate	-0.3 pts	-0.7 pts	to	0.1 pts
Participation rate	0.1 pts	-0.3 pts	to	0.5 pts

INQUIRIES

For further information about these and related statistics, email client.services@abs.gov.au\> or contact the National Information and Referral Service on 1300 135 070.