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NOTE: This is the final issue of Persons Not In the Labour Force, Underemployed Workers and Job Search Experience, Australia, February 2014 - 6226.0.55.001, This information is now available in Participation, Job Search and Mobility (cat. no. 6226.0).

More information regarding changes to the supplementary survey programme can be found in Information paper: Outcomes of the Labour Household Surveys Content Review, 2012 (cat. no. 6107.0), or contact labourforce@abs.gov.au

ABOUT THIS RELEASE

Statistics in this release are compiled from the Persons Not In the Labour Force (PNILF), Underemployed Workers (UEW) and Job Search Experience (JSE) survey that was conducted throughout Australia in February 2014 as a supplement to the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) monthly Labour Force Survey (LFS).

Persons not in the labour force presents statistics about whether people not in the labour force wanted to work; reasons why they were not actively looking for work, or were not available for work; and their main activity while not in the labour force.

Underemployed workers presents statistics on underemployed workers including the number of hours usually worked, number of preferred hours, steps taken to find work with more hours and difficulties finding work with more hours.

Job Search Experience presents statistics about the job search experiences of unemployed people, in terms of the steps taken to find work, and the difficulties they have encountered in finding work. It also provides information about employed people, who started their current job in the previous 12 months or were employed for more than a year in their current job and looked for work.

Care should be taken when comparing the estimates for PNILF, UEW and JSE with previous years as PNILF and UEW were previously collected in September, and JSE was previously collected in July. There is potential seasonal variations in the experiences of some of these groups.

Due to problems experienced with the collection of education data for the JSE populations, this data is not available. For more information, see paragraphs 19–21 of the Explanatory Notes.


PARTICIPATION, JOB SEARCH AND MOBILITY (PJSM) SUPPLEMENTARY SURVEY

The ABS has combined the seven regular labour supplementary surveys into two surveys - the Participation, Job Search and Mobility (PJSM) survey conducted in February each year from 2015 and the Characteristics of Employees (COE) survey conducted each August from 2014.

This survey is an interim collection combining three of the four surveys that form the PJSM survey that were not previously collected in February to provide a bridge to the fully combined PJSM survey. The fourth survey included in the PJSM survey is Labour Mobility which was last run in February 2013.

The PJSM survey will provide information on unemployment, underemployment, labour force participation, job change and job search in the Australian labour market.

The new PJSM supplementary survey integrates key elements of the Labour Mobility, Job Search Experience (JSE), Underemployed Workers (UEW) and Persons Not in the Labour Force (PNILF) surveys. The Labour Mobility survey was run for the last time in February 2013 and the other three surveys were run for the last time in their traditional form in February 2014 before being integrated in February 2015.

PJSM will describe some of the key features and labour market experiences of the economically active population as well as those not in the labour force, and provide insight into:

• job change;
• job mobility;
• job search;
• participation and increasing participation;
• underemployment; and
• marginal attachment.