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Job ads rise for third month in a row

The services sector continues to prop up the jobs market, with overall economic activity tipped to remain solid for at least the next year.

The number of job advertisements on the internet and in newspapers edged up 0.4 per cent last month, building on a 3.8 per cent gain in September.

Job ads in the 12 months to October rose 12.1 per cent, seasonally adjusted figures from ANZ show.

ANZ chief economist Warren Hogan said non-mining industries are being supported by the falling Australian dollar, low interest rates and the housing boom.

“In particular, many service industries are experiencing relatively strong demand, and these industries are typically quite labour intensive,” he said.

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Mr Hogan said despite ongoing sharp falls in resources investment and commodity price declines, the overall economy is tracking well and is expected to remain reasonably solid over the next 12-18 months.

Labour market conditions should remain sound near term, with chances the jobless rate could decrease slightly.

“But the strength of support to labour-intensive sectors is likely to wane in the first half of 2016, resulting in a softening in jobs growth and no obvious inroads into unemployment,” he said.

“Our view remains that this will ultimately prove too uncomfortable for the RBA and a little more monetary policy support will be provided by mid-2016.”

The Reserve Bank will meet in December to announce its final cash rate decision for 2015, after leaving rates on hold at the record low of two per cent last week.

Newspaper job ads jumped three per cent in October, but were down 15.3 per cent compared with a year ago. Internet job ads rose 0.3 per cent in the month and were 12.9 per cent higher over the year.

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