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CHANGES IN THIS AND UPCOMING LABOUR FORCE ISSUES


CHANGED SEASONAL ADJUSTMENT OF MONTHLY LABOUR FORCE ESTIMATES

The seasonal pattern previously evident for the July, August and September labour force estimates is not apparent in 2014. As there is little evidence of seasonality in these months for 2014, the ABS has decided that for these months the seasonal factors will be set to one (other than for the aggregate monthly hours worked series).


UPCOMING CHANGE TO LABOUR FORCE OUTPUTS

Changes to the pdf, spreadsheets and data cubes in this publication and in the detailed monthly Labour Force release (cat. no. 6291.0.55.001) will be implemented from the October 2014 issues. Changes to the detailed quarterly Labour Force release will be implemented with the November 2014 issue.

Blank templates of the new spreadsheets and datacubes are available from the Downloads tab of the October 2014 issue of the Information Paper: Forthcoming Changes to Labour Force Statistics (cat. no. 6292.0). This information paper has been reissued to clarify the changes being made.

Key dates in 2014 for these changes are:

9 October: Revised issue of the Information Paper: Forthcoming Changes to Labour Force Statistics (cat. no. 6292.0) released; blank templates for the spreadsheets and data cubes in this publication available from the downloads tab of the revised Information Paper.

16 October: Blank templates for the spreadsheets and data cubes in the detailed monthly and quarterly Labour Force release (cat. nos 6291.0.55.001 and 6291.0.55.003) available from the downloads tab of the revised Information Paper.

6 November: Changes to the pdf, spreadsheets and data cubes implemented in the October 2014 issue of this publication.

18 December: Changes to spreadsheets and data cubes implemented in the November 2014 issue of the detailed quarterly Labour Force release (cat. no. 6291.0.55.003).

As advised in previous issues, these changes have arisen from the ABS review in 2010-11 of content included in the labour household survey program, as described in the Information Paper: Outcomes of the Labour Household Surveys Content Review, 2012 (cat. no. 6107.0).

There have not been any changes to the format of the pdf, spreadsheets or data cube in this issue. However, changes have already been made to the related detailed monthly and quarterly releases and further changes to all releases are planned.


CHANGE TO THE TIMING OF QUARTERLY REBENCHMARKING

With the new monthly outputs commencing from the October 2014 issues, quarterly rebenchmarking (which revises estimates to reflect the latest Estimated Resident Population) planned for the October 2014 issue will be deferred by one month. In addition, the timing of the quarterly rebenchmarking will change to coincide with months where additional quarterly Labour Force data is released. This will allow rebenchmarked data for all monthly and quarterly series to be published on a consistent basis at the same time. The first regular quarterly rebenchmarking will occur in the November 2014 issue, and subsequently with future February, May, August and November issues.


CHANGES ALREADY MADE TO LABOUR FORCE OUTPUTS

The following changes have already been made to the detailed monthly and quarterly Labour Force releases:

• Products produced for the final time with the June 2014 issue of the detailed monthly Labour Force release (cat. no. 6291.0.55.001) and not available with future issues are:
  • Spreadsheet tables 15a and 15b;
  • Data cube EM2 - this will be replaced by two separate data cubes from the January 2015 issue;
  • Data cube UM1;
  • Data cube RM2.
• Products produced for the final time with the May 2014 issue of the detailed quarterly Labour Force release (cat. no. 6291.0.55.003) and not available with future issues are:
  • Spreadsheet table 18 - this was previously highlighted to be removed from the November 2014 issue;
  • Data cube EO1;
  • Data cube UQ1 - this was previously highlighted to be removed from the November 2014 issue;
  • Data cube UQ2 - this will be replaced by two separate data cubes from the November 2014 issue;
  • Data cube UQ3 - this will be replaced by two separate data cubes from the November 2014 issue.

• duration of unemployment since last full-time job no longer being collected as this item was replaced by duration of unemployment in 2001 and is therefore obsolete (Spreadsheet tables 15a and 15b; Data cubes UM1 and RM2),
• changed response categories for unemployed persons regarding their reasons for unemployment (Spreadsheet table 18 and Data cube UQ1), and
• expanded scope and changed response categories for employed persons who worked fewer than their usual number of hours during the reference week (Data cube EM2 which will be replaced, and Data cube EO1 for which the information will largely be available in other products).