6254.0 - Career Experience, Australia, November 1996  
ARCHIVED ISSUE Released at 11:30 AM (CANBERRA TIME) 27/06/1997   
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MEDIA RELEASE

June 27, 1997
Embargoed: 11:30 AM (AEST)
80/1997

Australia's employment experience

In November last year, 75 per cent of Australia's 6,857,400 employees had been with their current employer for one year or more. Of these, almost all (93 per cent) had experienced some change in their work in the previous 12 months, according to figures released today by the Australian Bureau of Statistics in the publication Career Experience, Australia, November 1996.

The most common changes reported were: more responsibility (37 per cent), new, different or extra duties (34 per cent) and changed hours (18 per cent). Other changes surveyed were: changed location (9 per cent), transferred (8 per cent) and promoted (7 per cent).

Other findings for employees who had been with their current employer for one year or more were:
  • Full-time employees were more likely to be promoted or transferred (8 per cent promoted and 9 per cent transferred) than part-time employees (3 per cent promoted and 4 per cent transferred).
  • Younger employees were more likely to be promoted or transferred than older persons. An estimated 12 per cent of employees aged 20-29 years had been promoted and 11 per cent had been transferred. Some 7 per cent of employees aged 30-54 years had been promoted and 7 per cent had been transferred.
  • People employed as managers and administrators had the highest rate of promotion (11 per cent) and associate professionals had the highest rate of transfer between jobs (12 per cent) than other occupations. Intermediate clerical, sales and service workers also had a high rate of promotion or transfer (11 per cent promoted and 11 per cent transferred).

The survey also reported that an estimated 222,700 employees who had worked with their current employer for more than six months had taken a break from their current employment of six months or more. Females made up the majority (67 per cent) of these persons. Females also made up 98 per cent of all persons who took a break from work for family reasons.

Of those employees with children under six years of age, 685,500 employees had taken leave or left the labour force when their youngest child was born. Females made up 95 per cent of 83,400 employees who had left the labour force when their youngest child was born. Males made up 90 per cent of persons who took paid leave only and females made up 74 per cent of persons who took unpaid leave only.

Copies of the publication Career Experience, Australia, November 1996 (cat. no. 6254.0) are available from ABS Bookshops.