Multiple job-holders

Latest release

The number and prevalence of people working more than one job, their demographic and employment characteristics and working arrangements.

Reference period
September 2025
Released
5/12/2025
  • Next Release 13/03/2026
    Multiple job-holders, December 2025
  • Next Release 12/06/2026
    Multiple job-holders, March 2026
  • View all releases
Release date and time
05/12/2025 11:30am AEDT

Key statistics

For September 2025:

  • There were 973,000 multiple job-holders (6.5% of employed people)
  • 7.6% of employed women were multiple job-holders, compared to 5.6% of employed men
  • Workers aged 20-24 years old were most likely to be working multiple jobs (8.2%)
  • People who were a Community and personal service worker in their main job were most likely to be a multiple job-holder (11.3%).

Sources of multiple job-holder data

This multi-source release, published alongside the quarterly Labour Account, supports headline estimates in the Labour Account by providing additional detail on the characteristics of multiple job-holders.

This release brings together data from the following ABS sources on multiple job-holders: 

Data impacts and changes

Revisions this quarter

Updates to Multiple job-holders estimates

The ABS is producing an expanded Labour Account series, which includes estimates of multiple job-holders by sex and age, and industry. These updated estimates will be published a week after the Labour Account, December quarter 2025 is released, on Friday, 13th March 2026.

The estimates calculated in the expanded Labour Account will replace some of the series which are included in the Multiple job-holders publication. Due to differences in the concepts and methods used in the published Multiple job-holders series, and the Labour Account expanded series, there will be some minor revisions to the series. To align with the timing of the release of the expanded Labour Account series, Multiple job-holders, December quarter 2025 will also be published on on Friday, 13th March 2026.

Both the expanded Labour Account and the Multiple job-holders industry estimates use the Labour Account as the primary data source.

Multiple job-holding over time

In September 2025, there were 973,000 multiple job-holders, compared to 14.0 million single job-holders. This was an increase of 2.2% from June 2025 when there were 952,000 multiple job-holders.

Between 1994 and 2019, the multiple job-holding rate remained between 5.0% and 6.0%. However, following a large decline in June 2020 as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic, the multiple job-holding rate rose and has remained at an all time high between 6.4% and 6.7% since June 2022. 

Source: Labour Account Australia (seasonally adjusted)

Sex

In September 2025, the rate of multiple job-holding was higher for women (7.6% compared with 5.6% for men). Over the past five years, on average, the multiple job-holding rate amongst women has been around 1.9 percentage points higher than men.

Note: The sum of males and females does not equal the headline estimates of multiple job-holders from the Labour Account as the number of male and female multiple job-holders is sourced directly from the Labour Force Survey. The Labour Account includes adjustments to account for populations which are out of scope for the Labour Force Survey, namely child workers, short-term non-residents and defence force personnel.

Source: Labour Force, Australia (original)

Age

Employed people aged 20-24 were more likely to be multiple job-holders in September 2025. In contrast, 4.8% of employed people aged 65 years and over were multiple job-holders. 

Estimates for smaller age groups are generally based on smaller counts and are subject to higher degrees of sampling variability. 

Source: Labour Force, Australia (original)

Estimates for smaller age groups are generally based on smaller counts and are subject to higher degrees of sampling variability. 

Source: Labour Force, Australia (original)

Industry

People working in the Administrative and support services industry in their main job had the highest multiple job-holding rate in September 2025 (8.9%). Multiple job-holding was least common among people whose main job was in Electricity, gas, water and waste services (3.2%).

It is important to note that some industries lend themselves to multiple job-holding. For example, some workers in Agriculture, forestry and fishing may work several seasonal jobs for different employers in addition to their main job; and some labour hire workers may work for a number of businesses in Administrative and support services.

Note: Multiple job-holding rate and levels are taken from the Labour Account. The number of male and female multiple job-holders by industry are derived from Jobs in Australia, and applied to the Labour Account level estimate.

Source: Labour Account Australia (seasonally adjusted) and Jobs in Australia 2022-23 (original)

The following diagrams show Jobs in Australia data for the most common combinations of industries of male and female multiple job-holder's main and second concurrent job.

For example, most female multiple job-holders whose main job was in Health care and social assistance also had their second job in Health care and social assistance, but there were many women whose main job was in Health care and social assistance and their second job in either Administrative and support services, Education and training, Retail trade or Accommodation and food services.

The data can be found in Jobs in Australia Table 4.

Industry of main and second job of female multiple job-holders, 2022-23

A sankey diagram showing the common industries where female multiple job-holders work for their main job and their second job

A sankey diagram showing the top 15 industry combinations of main and second jobs where female multiple job-holders work. The industries shown are:

Q - Health care and social assistance - with most having their main and second job in Health care and social assistance, followed by their main job in Health care and social assistance and their second job in either Administrative and support services, Education and training, Accommodation and food services or Retail trade.

P - Education and training - with most having their main and second job in Education and training, followed by their main job in Education and training and their second job in Health care and social assistance.

N - Administrative and support services - with most having their main and second job in Administrative and support services, followed by Administrative and support services in their main job, and their second job in Health care and social assistance.

H - Accommodation and food services - with most having their main and second job in Accommodation and food services, and some having their main job in Accommodation and food services and their second job in Retail trade, and a small portion having their main job in Accommodation and food and their second job in Administrative and support services.

G - Retail trade - with around two-thirds whose main job is in Retail trade having their second job in Retail trade, followed by having their main job in Retail trade and their second job in Accommodation and food services.

M - Professional, scientific and technical services - with most having both their main and second job in this industry.
 

Industry of main and second job of male multiple job-holders, 2022-23

A sankey diagram showing the common industries where male multiple job-holders work for their main job and their second job

A sankey diagram showing the top 15 industry combinations of main and second jobs where male multiple job-holders work. The industries shown are:

H - Accommodation and food services - with most having their main and second job in Accommodation and food services, and a small portion having their main job in Accommodation and food services and their second job in Administrative and support services.

N - Administrative and support service - with most having their main and second job in Administrative and support services.

G - Retail trade - with around two-thirds whose main job is in Retail having their second job in Retail, followed by having their main job in Retail trade their second job in Health care and social assistance.

C - Manufacturing - with most having their main job in Manufacturing, and their second job in Administrative and support services.

Q - Health care and social assistance - with most having their main and second job in this industry.

E - Construction - with a quarter whose main job is in Construction having their second job in Construction, followed by having their main job in Construction and their second job in either Administrative and support services, Public administration and safety, or Financial and insurance services.

O - Public administration and safety - with most having both their main and second job in this industry.

P - Education and training - with most having both their main and second job in this industry.

J -  Information media and telecommunications - with most having their main and second job in this industry.

M - Professional, scientific and technical services - with most having both their main and second job in this industry.

Occupation

In August 2025, 11.3% of all people who were a Community and personal service worker in their main job were multiple job-holders. Technicians and trade workers were least likely to be a multiple job-holder (4.1%).

Note: The sum of occupations does not equal the headline estimate of multiple job-holders from the Labour Account as the number of multiple job-holders, by occupation is sourced directly from the Labour Force Survey. The Labour Account includes adjustments to account for populations which are out of scope for the Labour Force Survey, namely child workers, short-term non-residents and defence force personnel.

Source: Labour Force, Australia (original)

Hours worked

In September 2025:

  • Multiple job-holders usually worked 30.5 hours, on average, in their main job, and 8.7 hours in their secondary job(s) - a total of 39.2 hours per week, on average
  • Single job-holders usually worked 34.8 hours per week, on average.

Multiple job-holders were most likely to work part-time hours (less than 35 hours per week) in both their main and secondary job(s), followed by a combination of full-time and part-time hours. There were a small number of people who had two full-time jobs.

Note: The full-time / part-time hours categories are based on hours actually worked in the reference week, so exclude employed people who were away from work.

Source: Longitudinal Labour Force, Australia (original)

 

Note: The full-time / part-time hours categories are based on hours actually worked in the reference week, so exclude employed people who were away from work. The small number of people working two full-time jobs have been excluded from this graph.

Source: Longitudinal Labour Force, Australia (original)

Geography

In September 2025, the multiple job-holding rate was higher in regional areas (7.0%) compared to capital cities (6.4%).

From December 2021 to December 2022, growth in multiple job-holding rates in capital cities led to a narrowing of the difference between rates in capital cities and the rest of Australia.

More recently, the rates of multiple job-holding in both capital cities and the rest of Australia have shown similar movements.

Source: Labour Force, Australia (original)

In September 2025, the multiple job-holding rate was highest in:

  • Capital city: Greater Hobart (9.1%)
  • Rest of state or territory: Western Australia (8.7%).

Multiple job-holding rates by Greater Capital City Statistical Area, September 2025

Loading map...

A map showing the multiple job-holding rate in each capital city, and the balance of each state and territory. The data are available in the Table view.

Footnotes

Source: Labour Force, Australia (original)

Data downloads

Table 1: Multiple job-holders rates and levels

Rates and levels of multiple job-holders time series. Sourced from the Labour Accounts.

Table 2: Multiple job-holders by age and sex

Time series of multiple job-holders by age and sex. Sourced from the Labour Force Survey

Table 3: Multiple job-holders income, by age, by sex and number of concurrent jobs

Median employment income of multiple job holders. Sourced from Jobs in Australia

Table 4: Multiple job-holders by industry, by sex, by median income

Multiple job-holders rates and levels by industry, by sex and by median income. Levels from the Labour Accounts are proportioned using Jobs in Australia sex data of industries. Median income data by industry sourced from Jobs in Australia 

Table 5: Multiple job-holders by selected characteristics

Multiple job-holders and employed persons by occupation, average usual hours worked, by State, by Greater Capital City Statistical Area, and by educational qualifications. Sourced from the Labour Force Survey.

All data downloads

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