November employment data flashes economic growth as new jobs exceed market forecast
The Australian economy generated some 50,000 new jobs in November that effectively cut down the country's jobless rate, which economists said could have improved more if only the workforce's participation rate gears up in a much steadier rate.
According to the latest job data released on Thursday by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS), the country's unemployment rate dipped from the 5.4 percent in October to 5.2 percent in November.
The improvement in Australia's job situation led to the creation of up to 54,600 more jobs for the economy and far exceeded the previously-set market forecast of 20,000 new jobs for the month.
Economists said that the country's job growth in the month was largely tempered by the record participation rate in November, reaching a high of 66.1 percent as compared to the 65.9 percent, still unrevised, in the previous month.
National Australia Bank chief economist Rob Henderson told AAP that "the only thing that saved the unemployment rate from falling to 5.1 per cent or lower was the increase in the participation rate," which is the number of Australians actively seeking work.
Henderson described the result as solid amidst some indicators that demand may be declining although he pointed to assertions made earlier by the Australian central bank that the country's labour market is presently propped up by buoyant market conditions.
The NAB economist added that judging from the impressive numbers posted by Queensland and Western Australia, it was proven again that the mining sector is a major fuel in the national economy as it created the most jobs newly available for Australians.
On the other hand, Henderson argued that the encouraging job data registered by New South Wales provided glaring indications that the economy as a whole is expanding and more sectors, apart from mining, are contributing to the national growth.
Also, the country's job data improvement prompted ICAP senior economist Adam Carr to agree that the Australian is strengthening further as he told AAP that "these are very good numbers and they show why this growing pessimism on the Australian economy is completely unwarranted.
The numbers, according to Carr, pointed to the underlying stability of the local economy and the only downside is the data could convince the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) to move for a rate hike between the months of January to March next year.
He said that despite the mixed signals provided by the latest retail numbers and gross domestic product (GDP) data, the encouraging spikes in the Australian employment market only proved that the economy is in a robust stage.