• Summary
• Downloads
• Explanatory Notes
• Related Information
• Past Releases

WHAT'S NEW IN THE LABOUR FORCE


CHANGES TO LABOUR FORCE OUTPUTS

While the July 2015 issue of Labour Force, Australia (cat. no 6202.0) published spreadsheets and data cubes in new formats, this issue of the detailed monthly publication published spreadsheets and data cubes in the existing format consistent with the June 2015 release. The ABS plans to publish new format spreadsheets and data cubes for all Labour Force publications from the August 2015 issues onwards.

These new format spreadsheets and data cubes will be published in the formats presented in the Information Paper: Forthcoming Changes to Labour Force Statistics, October 2014 (cat. no. 6292.0). A version of the new format spreadsheets containing data for this publication was attached to the Information Paper in July 2015. This version contained data as at the May 2015 issue. Spreadsheets for Labour Force, Australia (cat. no 6202.0) containing data as per the April 2015 issue were previously released with the Information Paper in May 2015. A concordance between the current and new time series identifiers was also included.

While changes to the table structure for continuing data items should not by itself cause revisions to historical Labour Force data, minor revisions to previously published data will be seen across a number of Labour Force series when new structures are introduced. The broad reasons for these revisions are outlined below:

• The method used to aggregate estimates from the individual records has changed. The process has been improved to now use only one source table, which will ensure greater consistency across outputs and facilitate more regular rebenchmarking. This single source stores data at a more finely detailed level than before since all classification items have been collated into one table, which results in a greatly increased number of cross products. As a result, estimates produced from this new source are negligibly different to what was previously published due to an alternative accumulation of rounding error. This effect mostly applies to periods before August 2006, due to the reclassification of low level data to match the latest industry and occupation standards. Data previously collected under older classifications are proportionally split into the relevant categories under the latest standards, resulting in even more finely detailed information in the source table for these earlier periods. This method of reclassification is consistent with the established processes used to produce the current industry and occupation estimates. For the first time, occupation data collected between August 1986 and November 1990 has been reclassified from the originally collected ASCO First Edition into the latest ANZSCO classification, and this time series has been restored to outputs. To ensure consistency across all outputs, there are minor revisions to estimates for this period.
• Incorrect Year of Arrival around the calendar year 2000. Year of Arrival data for the period did not have a complete date, which prevented the appropriate number of records being matched for determining gross flows. This issue has been rectified, as a result more records are available for matching. The minimum difference at the most detailed level of cross tabulation is -1,800, the maximum difference is 6,300 persons. Discrepancies occur at varying time points with the largest concentration of discrepancies occurring from the start of the series to 2000/01.

• The following new items from the November 2015 issue of Labour Force, Australia (cat. no 6202.0) and the detailed quarterly publication (cat. no. 6291.0.55.003):
  • Monthly underutilisation
  • Volume measures of labour underutilisation
  • Leave entitlements
  • Retrenchment
  • Sector of main job (public / private)
  • Educational attainment
  • Educational attendance for the whole civilian population.