MAY KEY FIGURES

		Apr 2017	May 2017	Apr 17 to May 17		May 16 to May 17
Trend
	Employed persons ('000)	12 097.0	12 122.1	25.2		1.6	%
	Unemployed persons ('000)	734.0	729.2	-4.8		0.8	%
	Unemployment rate (%)	5.7	5.7	0.0	pts	0.0	pts
	Participation rate (%)	64.8	64.8	0.0	pts	0.0	pts
Seasonally Adjusted
	Employed persons ('000)	12 110.7	12 152.6	42.0		2.0	%
	Unemployed persons ('000)	730.5	711.9	-18.6		-1.5	%
	Unemployment rate (%)	5.7	5.5	-0.2	pts	-0.2	pts
	Participation rate (%)	64.8	64.9	0.0	pts	0.1	pts

Employed Persons

Unemployment Rate

MAY KEY POINTS


TREND ESTIMATES (MONTHLY CHANGE)

• Employment increased 25,200 to 12,122,100.
• Unemployment decreased 4,800 to 729,200.
• Unemployment rate remained steady at 5.7%.
• Participation rate remained steady at 64.8%.
• Monthly hours worked in all jobs increased 2.9 million hours (0.18%) to 1,677.7 million hours.

SEASONALLY ADJUSTED ESTIMATES (MONTHLY CHANGE)

• Employment increased 42,000 to 12,152,600. Full-time employment increased 52,100 to 8,287,400 and part-time employment decreased 10,100 to 3,865,200.
• Unemployment decreased 18,600 to 711,900. The number of unemployed persons looking for full-time work decreased 23,000 to 489,300 and the number of unemployed persons only looking for part-time work increased 4,400 to 222,700.
• Unemployment rate decreased by 0.2 pts to 5.5%.
• Participation rate increased by less than 0.1 pts to 64.9%.
• Monthly hours worked in all jobs increased 31.1 million hours (1.87%) to 1,695.3 million hours.

LABOUR UNDERUTILISATION (QUARTERLY CHANGE)

• Trend estimates: the labour force underemployment rate increased 0.1 pts to 8.8%. The underutilisation rate remained steady at 14.5%.
• Seasonally adjusted estimates: the labour force underemployment rate decreased 0.1 pts to 8.8%. The underutilisation rate decreased 0.4 pts to 14.4%.

NOTES

FORTHCOMING ISSUES

ISSUE	Release Date
June 2017	20 July 2017
July 2017	17 August 2017
August 2017	14 September 2017
September 2017	19 October 2017
October 2017	16 November 2017
November 2017	14 December 2017

ANNUAL SEASONAL RE-ANALYSIS OF QUARTERLY LABOUR FORCE SERIES

The annual seasonal re-analysis of the Labour Force series was conducted on estimates up to February 2017. The results were used to improve the estimates for the monthly seasonally adjusted and trend series in the March 2017 issue.

Quarterly series have been updated with this issue, to coincide with May data.


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 APRIL 2017 AND MAY 2017
	Monthly change	95% Confidence interval
Total Employment	42 000	-17 200	to	101 200
Total Unemployment	-18 600	-56 000	to	18 800
Unemployment rate	-0.2 pts	-0.6 pts	to	0.2 pts
Participation rate	0.0 pts	-0.4 pts	to	0.4 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.