Matthew Abraham: Don’t believe Weatherill and Koutsantonis’s upbeat assessment — SA jobless figures are much worse than you think

DESPITE what Jay Weatherill and Tom Koutsantonis would have you believe, the jobless figures in SA are abysmal and the official unemployment figure provides a misleading picture, writes Matthew Abraham.

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HANDS up anyone, without the first name Jay or Tom, who thinks the state’s economy is going gangbusters. Well, that is extremely disappointing.

What’s wrong with you people? Haven’t you been paying attention?

From big batteries to film studios, South Australia has become so hip we just know that Elon Musk, the billionaire who makes cars for millionaires, would love to move here. If only he could afford the power bills.

If you need proof that things are on the up and up, don’t take Premier Jay Weatherill’s word for it.

Instead, look to the official barometer of a healthy or sick economy — the jobs figures published by the Australian Bureau of Statistics.

The latest stats show that despite the horror predictions of SA’s unemployment rising to double-digit territory following the GMH closure, the reverse has happened. It’s gone down.

The latest figures — from December — show the state’s trend unemployment rate is steady on 5.9 per cent, hovering just above the national average of 5.4 per cent.

Setting aside the two territories, that has us effectively neck and neck with every other state bar NSW, the nation’s economic powerhouse, which has unemployment down to 4.7 per cent.

The ABS figures seem to show that Adelaide has swallowed the loss of the beloved Holden factory at Elizabeth with barely a burp.

This is an astounding performance and, if the figures hold roughly through to next month’s election, removes a major negative from the Weatherill campaign. Or does it?

Because here is another uncomfortable question.

Who really thinks SA’s unemployment rate is 5.9 per cent? The answer is simple — not as many as the government would have you believe. Not by a long shot.

On February 2, The Australian published details of an exclusive survey by Roy Morgan pollsters that gauged Australian attitudes to the official unemployment figures.

It showed that more than half the nation believes the unemployment rate is a load of old cobblers.

Economics correspondent Adam Creighton reported that almost 60 per cent of those surveyed, including 70 per cent of 18 to 24-year-olds, think the unemployment rate is not around 5 per cent but is closer to 10, 15 or 20 per cent.

The credibility gap was widest in SA — 68 per cent of those surveyed thought our unemployment rate was between 10 and 20 per cent.

Pollster chief Gary Morgan said everyone knew the official figures were “nonsense”.

“The pollies know it, the ABS knows it, the Australian people know it,” he said, telling Creighton that he believed the popularity of Nick Xenophon’s SA Best party in SA was linked to a lack of honesty about the labour market.

In part, the cynicism can be pinned on the loopy criteria the Commonwealth uses to measure employment.

The ABS says you are employed if during a week you “worked for one hour or more for pay, profit, commission or payment in kind” or you worked without pay in a family business or farm. That’s one, miserable, crowded hour.

SA Premier Jay Weatherill and Energy Minister Tom Koutsantonis with Olympic Dam asset president Jacqui McGill at the Olympic Dam smelter last week. Picture: David Mariuz/AAP

The other factor at play in the jobs credibility gap is simple — people aren’t stupid.

We have a good gut feel for how our city and our state are travelling because it’s all around us.

Adelaide’s ridiculous roadworks binge may be doing wonders for the jobs spreadsheet in the short term but, deep down, we know that party cannot last.

When the government pulls another rabbit out of its job hat — from Violet Crumbles to Musk’s solar panels — the fine print always reveals fistfuls of taxpayers’ cash behind the decision.

Meanwhile, a serious player such as BHP was sledged by Weatherill last year as “just another coal company” for daring to suggest the state’s unreliable power supply and high power prices threatened jobs and investment. The statewide blackout cost BHP $137 million.

Our statistics are drawn from our own personal experience when trying to find or change jobs and also from the difficulty faced by our children, grandchildren, wider family and friends trying to land decent, rewarding and stable employment.

Adelaide deserves to be a city where the secure jobs aren’t just at Bunnings, as a barista at On The Run, as a traffic cone arranger — or as a government spin doctor.