Summary: Job ads up again in April; ads doubled since April 2020; “signalling ongoing declines” in jobless rate; hiring by businesses “not heavily dependent” on JobKeeper.
From mid-2017 onwards, year-on-year growth rates in the total number of Australian job advertisements consistently exceeded 10%. That was until mid-2018 when the annual growth rate fell back markedly. 2019 was notable for its reduced employment advertising and this trend continued into the first quarter of 2020. Figures plunged in April and May of 2020 as pandemic restrictions took effect but then recovered relatively quickly.
According to the latest ANZ figures, total advertisements increased by 4.7% in April on a seasonally-adjusted basis. The rise followed a 7.8% increase in March and a 7.2% gain in February after revisions. On a 12-month basis, total job advertisements were 198.8% higher than in April 2020, up from March’s comparable figure of 39.2%.
“ANZ Job Ads is still signalling ongoing declines in the unemployment rate,” said ANZ senior economist Catherine Birch.
The figures were released on the same day as the Inflation Gauge reading but Commonwealth bond yields hardly moved on the day as they followed a subdued session in US Treasury bond markets overnight. By the close of business, the 3-year ACGB yield had slipped 1bp to 0.26% while 10-year and 20-year yields each finished 1bp higher at 1.71% and 2.43% respectively.
Birch said, “It is not surprising that ANZ Job Ads has continued to rise post-JobKeeper. Businesses looking to hire new workers are, on the whole, unlikely to be those that were heavily dependent on the JobKeeper payment.” However, she also expects “many but not all” who do lose their jobs in the months following the end of the programme “will be able to find work elsewhere relatively quickly” given the current strength of the labour market.
The inverse relationship between job advertisements and the unemployment rate has been quite strong (see below chart), although ANZ themselves called the relationship between the two series into question in early 2019. A rising number of job advertisements as a proportion of the labour force is suggestive of lower unemployment rates in the near-future. A falling ratio suggests higher unemployment rates will follow.