Labour Account Australia

Latest release

The Australian Labour Account provides quarterly time series data, consisting of four quadrants: Jobs, Persons, Hours and Payments

Reference period
March 2025
Released
6/06/2025
  • Next Release 5/09/2025
    Labour Account Australia, June 2025
  • Next Release 5/12/2025
    Labour Account Australia, September 2025
  • View all releases

Key statistics

In seasonally adjusted terms for the March quarter 2025:

  • total jobs decreased 0.2% to 16.3 million
  • filled jobs decreased 0.1% to 15.9 million
  • secondary jobs decreased 4.2% to 1.1 million
  • proportion of vacant jobs decreased to 2.0%
  • multiple job-holders decreased 2.8% to 963,100
  • hours worked increased 0.3% to 6.0 billion hours.
Key statistics - Seasonally adjusted
 Mar-25Quarterly change (%)Annual change (%)
Jobs 
 Total jobs16,261,000-0.2%1.7%
 Filled jobs15,931,500-0.1%2.0%
 Job vacancies329,600-4.0%-9.4%
 Main jobs14,869,5000.2%2.4%
 Secondary jobs1,061,900-4.2%-3.8%
 Proportion of vacant jobs2.0%nana
People 
 Employed people14,896,8000.4%2.4%
 Multiple job holders963,100-2.8%-1.1%
 Multiple job holding rate6.5%nana
Hours 
 Hours actually worked5,961.6 million0.3%2.3%
Payments 
 Average income per employed person$24,755.10 1.4%4.0%
Key statistics - Trend
 Mar-25Quarterly change (%)Annual change (%)
Jobs 
 Total jobs16,302,6000.3%2.0%
 Filled jobs15,969,3000.3%2.3%
 Job vacancies333,300-1.2%-8.4%
 Main jobs14,887,5000.4%2.5%
 Secondary jobs1,081,900-0.9%-0.8%
 Proportion of vacant jobs2.0%nana
People 
 Employed people14,911,5000.6%2.5%
 Multiple job holders977,800-0.2%1.7%
 Multiple job holding rate6.6%nana
Hours 
 Hours actually worked5,963.6 million0.3%2.2%
Payments 
 Average income per employed person$24,689.501.0%3.6%

Future improvements to the Labour Account

In 2024 the ABS was funded to expand the Labour Account to provide estimates of the total hours spent on unpaid care and their monetary value. These measures will improve the visibility of the contribution of unpaid care to society and the economy, alongside the extensive information on paid work. This funding was also directed at modelling sex and age components to existing Labour Account data, to provide a meaningful point of comparison with estimates of unpaid care.

An initial information paper on unpaid care was published in November 2024, it presented a first set of experimental estimates of unpaid care in Australia for June quarter 2021, based on preliminary concepts and methods. Since this time, the ABS has undertaken a consultation process via the Consultation Hub and further refined the first estimates of unpaid childcare, in addition to developing estimates of unpaid adult care and producing a time series of unpaid care.

A further information paper will be published on 27th June 2025. This information paper will present:

  • additional experimental estimates of unpaid care in Australia for June quarter 2006 to September quarter 2024,
  • outcomes of the Consultation Hub process,
  • full details of models developed for sex and age estimates in the Labour Account, and
  • information on further plans and future directions.
     

State article

A State level feature article is being planned to accompany the next release of the Labour Account, Australia. The article will contain updated modelled indicative state and territory level industry jobs and hours worked estimates up to and including March quarter 2025. Previous editions of the state article contained data up to the June quarter of the relevant year, however, due to changes in source data availability this will not be possible for the next Labour Account release.

Guide to labour statistics

The Labour Account is the best source of quarterly industry and sector data. To learn more about our different labour measures, their purpose and how to use them, see our Guide to labour statistics. It provides summary information on labour market topics including Industry employment guide data. 

Factors affecting interpretation

Revisions this quarter

Stock and flow estimates

Jobs

In seasonally adjusted terms for the March quarter 2025:

  • filled jobs decreased by 0.1%, following a 0.3% rise in the December quarter 2024. Filled jobs grew by 2.0% through the year
  • the number of main jobs increased by 35,900 (or 0.2%)
  • the proportion of vacant jobs decreased to 2.0%
  • the number of public sector jobs decreased by 0.1%, while the number of private sector jobs decreased by 0.2%.

Total jobs

In seasonally adjusted terms for the March quarter 2025, the total number of jobs decreased by 24,700 (or 0.2%). This consisted of a decrease of 13,900 job vacancies and a decrease of 10,800 filled jobs.

Filled jobs

In seasonally adjusted terms for the March quarter 2025, the number of filled jobs decreased by 10,800 to 15.9 million.

  1. Larger than usual quarter-to-quarter changes occurred during the COVID-19 pandemic. The ABS recommends caution when using trend estimates published in spreadsheets in this release for this period.
Filled jobs, by industry, March quarter 2025, seasonally adjusted
Filled jobs ('000)Quarterly change (%)Annual change (%)
Agriculture, forestry and fishing (A)463.5-0.52.0
Mining (B)225.2-1.9-0.5
Manufacturing (C)917.3-0.6-0.1
Electricity, gas, water and waste services (D)141.91.26.3
Construction (E)1,249.61.31.1
Wholesale trade (F)558.8-0.8-2.9
Retail trade (G)1,515.6-0.81.6
Accommodation and food services (H)1,144.6-0.60.8
Transport, postal and warehousing (I)709.0-1.02.5
Information media and telecommunications (J)205.01.90.6
Financial and insurance services (K)517.9-0.11.4
Rental, hiring and real estate services (L)290.9-1.00.0
Professional, scientific and technical services (M)1,317.61.51.5
Administrative and support services (N)1,065.30.70.8
Public administration and safety (O)876.0-0.34.1
Education and training (P)1,269.00.03.4
Health care and social assistance (Q)2,627.1-0.45.8
Arts and recreation services (R)263.40.7-9.4
Other services (S)573.7-0.33.4
Total all industries15,931.5-0.12.0

Main and secondary jobs

In seasonally adjusted terms for the March quarter 2025:

  • main jobs increased by 35,900 (or 0.2%)
  • secondary jobs decreased by 46,700 (or 4.2%)
  • the proportion of secondary jobs to filled jobs decreased to 6.7%.

The three industries with the highest number of secondary jobs were Health care and social assistance, Administrative and support services, and Education and training.

Secondary jobs can be held by people who have their main job in the same or a different industry. 

Statistical discrepancy - Filled jobs

People

In seasonally adjusted terms for the Match quarter 2025:

  • the total number of employed people increased by 0.4% to 14.9 million
  • the number of multiple job holders decreased by 2.8%
  • unemployed people increased by 11,300 people to 606,000.
  1. Larger than usual quarter-to-quarter changes occurred during the COVID-19 pandemic. The ABS recommends caution when using trend estimates published in spreadsheets in this release for this period.

The three industries with the highest number of employed people in the March quarter 2025 were Health care and social assistance, Retail trade, and Professional, scientific and technical services. 

Hours

In seasonally adjusted terms for the March quarter 2025, the total number of hours actually worked increased by 15.2 million hours (or 0.3%) to 6.0 billion hours.

  1. Larger than usual quarter-to-quarter changes occurred during the COVID-19 pandemic. The ABS recommends caution when using trend estimates published in spreadsheets in this release for this period.

The three industries with the highest number of hours actually worked in the March quarter 2025 were Health care and social assistance, Construction, and Professional, scientific and technical services. 

Payments

The Labour Account Payments quadrant presents the costs incurred by enterprises in employing labour, and the income received by people from its provision. Total income consists of compensation of employees and labour income from self-employment. The addition of other related costs to employers to total income will derive total labour costs.

In seasonally adjusted terms for the March quarter 2025:

  • total labour income increased by $6,594 million (or 1.8%) to $368,771 million
  • the average labour income per employed person increased by 1.4% to $24,755
  • total compensation of employees increased by 1.5% to $339,226 million
  • labour income from self-employment increased by 5.5% to $29,545 million
  • total labour costs increased by $6,610 million (or 1.7%) to $392,460 million.

 

  1. Larger than usual quarter-to-quarter changes occurred during the COVID-19 pandemic. The ABS recommends caution when using trend estimates published in spreadsheets in this release for this period.

The three industries with the highest total labour income in the March quarter 2025 were Health care and social assistance, Professional, scientific and technical services, and Construction.

Data downloads

Time series spreadsheets

Quarterly estimates for Jobs, People, Hours and Payments by Industry Division and Total All Industries.

Data files

Post-release change

11 June 2025: This re-release corrects minor rounding issues to Data Downloads and Data Explorer. All other content on the page has not been impacted.

Subdivison datasets

Industry subdivision estimates are available through Data Explorer.

Data Explorer datasets

Labour Account balanced 

  • Quarterly balanced original estimates for Jobs, People, Hours and Payments are available by Industry Subdivision, Division and Total All Industries.
  • Quarterly balanced seasonally adjusted and trend estimates for Job, People, Hours and Payments are available by Industry Division and Total all industries. For further information, please see the Updates page. 

For information on Data Explorer and how it works, see the Data explorer user guide.

Previous catalogue number

This release previously used catalogue number 6150.0.55.003.

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