Employees are shunning the 9-5 treadmill

Fewer Australians are working gruelling hours, as the lure of part-time work and a comfortable work-life balance shifts our concept­ of the working week.

The snapshot report shows that a large proportion of the growing number of part-time workers are women, a demographic that reached its highest employment rate yet, 70 per cent, last year. Photo: iStock.

Fewer Australians are working gruelling hours, as the lure of part-time work and a comfortable work-life balance shifts our concept­ of the working week.

According to the Australian Institute­ of Health and Welfare’s snapshot of employment data, the percentage of employees working 50 hours or more per week has dropped from 16 per cent in 2009 to 13.6 per cent last year.

The trend is in part spurred by a growing number of part-time workers — those working fewer than 35 hours per week — who made up 31 per cent of the workforce last year compared with 28 per cent a decade earlier.

The snapshot report shows that a large proportion of the growing number of part-time workers are women, a demographic that reached its highest employment rate yet, 70 per cent, last year.

The report also finds that, despite­ the growth in the workforce, the popularity of apprenticeships has plummeted to its lowest level in 20 years.

Government statistics show 267,400 Australians were working as apprentices and trainees last year, compared with 336,600 in 2014. The drop is more notice­able in those choosing to begin an apprentice­ship, with just 161,700 first-year apprentices last year compared with 377,000 in 2012.

The report also finds dropout rates exceeded completion rates for apprenticeships last year.

Luke Radford, general manag­er of Apprenticeship Careers Australia, said he was not surprised by the declining apprenticeship figures­, which he says are the resul­t of aggressive marketing from universities to school stud­ents and parents.

Mr Radford, whose business recruits apprentices nationwide and helps match them with employers, said the apprenticeship community hadn’t been able to match the universities’ campaigns and fight stigmas around entering a trade.

“The amount of money that’s being spent on advertising that university is the way to go is extremel­y challenging for school students to understand what’s available from an apprenticeship,” he said. “The biggest thing is the messages kids are getting in school. The careers advisers are giving them materials from all the universities, and parents want their kids to go to university to becom­e a doctor or a lawyer or work in IT.”

Mr Radford said recent infrastructure announcements from the NSW and Victorian governments had created a huge demand for tradespeople and other skilled jobs that were not being met with any rising interest in apprenticeships.

For 21-year-old Ethan Gersbach, there was no stigma around his decision to start an apprenticeship after finishing school in 2016.

He is in the third year of his four-year apprenticeship as a shopfitter at Inline Aluminium in the southwest Sydney suburb of Milperra, and hopes to one day open a business with the skills he’s learning as a fitting assistant.

“It’s been great because it teaches you important skills while you’re also able to earn income. You can’t really get that anywhere else,” Mr Gersbach said.