Estimates of public sector employee jobs and cash wages and salaries by level of government, state and industry
There were 2,597,300 public sector employee jobs in the month of June 2025 comprising:
Total public sector employee jobs increased 3.3% between June 2024 and June 2025.
Total public sector cash wages and salaries increased 7.6% in 2024-25 to $249,513.0 million.
Public Sector Employment and Earnings is the source of the highest quality public sector employee jobs and cash wages and salaries estimates, along with the Labour Account Australia which produces both public and private sector estimates for quarterly reference periods.
The 'employee' label has been updated to 'employee Jobs' in this release to more accurately reflect the concept being measured which is described in the Glossary section of the Methodology Page.
Although cash wages and salaries estimates relate to the full twelve months of the financial year, employee job estimates relate to the month of June in the given year. Given these differences, the ABS does not recommend using these components together to calculate average cash wages and salaries per employee job.
Total estimates throughout this release are calculated using un-rounded values. Totals may differ from, though are more accurate than the sum of components displayed.
| Employee jobs ('000) | Cash wages and salaries ($m) | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jun-24 | Jun-25 | 2023-24 | 2024-25 | |
| Commonwealth Government | 365.4 | 385.9 | 37,318.6 | 40,858.0 |
| State Government | 1,936.4 | 1,993.4 | 178,032.5 | 191,077.5 |
| Local Government | 213.5 | 218.0 | 16,445.5 | 17,577.6 |
| Total Public Sector | 2,515.3 | 2,597.3 | 231,796.6 | 249,513.0 |
| June 2024 | June 2025 | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| C'wealth | State | Local | Total | C'wealth | State | Local | Total | |
| NSW | 86.9 | 557.3 | 63.4 | 707.6 | 91.6 | 566.1 | 65.2 | 723.0 |
| Vic. | 62.9 | 485.9 | 57.4 | 606.1 | 65.6 | 493.2 | 58.1 | 616.9 |
| Qld | 50.0 | 406.2 | 48.1 | 504.3 | 52.9 | 425.4 | 48.8 | 527.0 |
| SA | 21.3 | 143.2 | 11.6 | 176.1 | 23.2 | 149.3 | 11.7 | 184.2 |
| WA | 19.0 | 219.8 | 25.5 | 264.3 | 20.0 | 232.3 | 26.5 | 278.8 |
| Tas. | 6.0 | 54.8 | 4.6 | 65.4 | 5.8 | 56.3 | 4.8 | 66.9 |
| NT | 9.5 | 31.6 | 3.0 | 44.1 | 9.7 | 32.4 | 3.0 | 45.0 |
| ACT | 109.8 | 37.5 | . . | 147.4 | 117.1 | 38.2 | . . | 155.4 |
| Australia | 365.4 | 1,936.4 | 213.5 | 2,515.3 | 385.9 | 1,993.4 | 218.0 | 2,597.3 |
. . the ACT Legislative Assembly is responsible for both state and local government responsibilities. Therefore, ACT results are displayed under the ACT state estimates and associated totals.
| 2023-24 | 2024-25 | |||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| C'wealth | State | Local | Total | C'wealth | State | Local | Total | |
| NSW | 8,938.0 | 52,348.7 | 5,052.8 | 66,339.4 | 9,726.1 | 55,444.1 | 5,478.4 | 70,648.6 |
| Vic. | 6,362.8 | 42,980.4 | 4,028.2 | 53,371.5 | 6,847.8 | 45,733.2 | 4,209.2 | 56,790.2 |
| Qld | 5,004.7 | 39,433.9 | 4,114.1 | 48,552.7 | 5,485.3 | 42,841.7 | 4,409.3 | 52,736.3 |
| SA | 2,151.3 | 11,951.9 | 958.8 | 15,062.0 | 2,433.8 | 12,703.3 | 1,014.4 | 16,151.5 |
| WA | 1,911.3 | 19,544.8 | 1,775.7 | 23,231.7 | 2,097.8 | 21,697.7 | 1,927.3 | 25,722.8 |
| Tas. | 566.3 | 4,740.9 | 323.4 | 5,630.6 | 586.9 | 5,093.2 | 344.7 | 6,024.7 |
| NT | 901.9 | 3,290.4 | 192.6 | 4,384.9 | 951.8 | 3,475.8 | 194.2 | 4,621.7 |
| ACT | 11,482.3 | 3,741.5 | . . | 15,223.7 | 12,728.6 | 4,088.7 | . . | 16,817.2 |
| Australia | 37,318.6 | 178,032.5 | 16,445.5 | 231,796.6 | 40,858.0 | 191,077.5 | 17,577.6 | 249,513.0 |
. . the ACT Legislative Assembly is responsible for both state and local government responsibilities. Therefore, ACT results are displayed under the ACT state estimates and associated totals.
| Employee jobs ('000) | Cash wages and salaries ($m) | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jun-24 | Jun-25 | 2023-24 | 2024-25 | |
| Electricity, gas, water and waste services | 62.3 | 66.4 | 7,771.7 | 9,144.3 |
| Construction | 8.9 | 9.2 | 892.0 | 993.3 |
| Transport, postal and warehousing | 78.0 | 79.3 | 8,478.9 | 9,062.7 |
| Information media and telecommunications | 16.8 | 16.5 | 1,936.5 | 1,945.2 |
| Financial and insurance services | 18.4 | 19.8 | 2,253.7 | 2,498.9 |
| Rental, hiring and real estate services | 7.6 | 7.7 | 664.6 | 704.5 |
| Professional, scientific and technical services | 38.7 | 39.6 | 3,803.1 | 4,149.3 |
| Public administration and safety | 849.4 | 880.6 | 83,444.4 | 90,195.8 |
| Education and training | 753.9 | 768.3 | 57,904.5 | 61,399.3 |
| Health care and social assistance | 642.4 | 668.7 | 61,684.5 | 66,169.2 |
| Arts and recreation services | 22.8 | 23.6 | 1,568.5 | 1,634.5 |
| Other industries a. | 15.9 | 17.6 | 1,394.2 | 1,616.1 |
| All industries | 2,515.3 | 2,597.3 | 231,796.6 | 249,513.0 |
a. Includes Agriculture, forestry and fishing, Mining, Manufacturing, Wholesale trade, Retail trade, Accommodation and food services, Administrative and support services and Other services.
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This release previously used catalogue number 6248.0.55.002.
This release presents estimates of Public sector employee jobs and cash wages and salaries by state/territory, level of government and industry.
Data is available for:
Australian Tax Office (ATO) Single Touch Payroll (STP) administrative data combined with ABS Business Register data.
The ATO provides selected employer and employee level data from the STP system to the ABS. These data are combined with employer population and characteristics data from snapshots of the ABS Business Register.
Refer to the glossary for definitions of cash wages and salaries and employee jobs.
This release, based on STP data, replaced the Survey of Employment and Earnings data that was directly collected from businesses/organisations via a sample survey. The STP based series starts from 2021-22.