Number of female workers reaches highest level

Female participation in the workforce has reached its highest level, pushing the unemployment rate to 5.6 per cent.

The shift towards women has been put down to the growing share of part-time work, predominantly female.

Female participation in the workforce has reached its highest level, pushing the unemployment rate to 5.6 per cent, a sign the anticipated rise in wage growth could take longer than expected.

Almost 18,000 new jobs were created last month, marking 17 consecutive months of employment growth and capping a 12-month period in which the economy added a record 421,000 workers.

“On the 40th anniversary of the monthly ABS labour force survey we have seen the largest annual increase in total and full-time employment ever recorded,” Jobs Minister Michaelia Cash said.

Full-time jobs surged 65,000 while part-time jobs fell 47,000 compared with January.

The workforce participation rate, the share of the working age population in or looking for work, rose to 65.7 per cent, the highest since 1978 in trend terms.

“A significant number of the new jobs created have been filled by people coming into the workforce, particularly women and older workers,” said BIS Oxford economist Sarah Hunter.

The trend participation rate for women (which strips out volatility) rose to 60.6 per cent, the highest recorded level. In 1978, the first year of the ABS’s monthly jobs survey, 43.4 per cent work working-age women were in or looking for work. Over the same period the participation rate for men has fallen from 79 per cent to 71 per cent.

Economists put the shift ­towards women down to the growing share of part-time work, which is predominantly female, and the growth of the service ­sector.

Growing demand for work pushed the ranks of the unemployed to 734,000, the highest since last March.

Strong growth in job market.

The jobless rate had been falling steadily last year, reaching 5.4 per cent in November, the lowest since 2013. The more ­recent rise is at odds with the ­government’s and Reserve Bank’s desire for spare capacity in the ­labour market to fall and put upward pressure on wages. Wages growth has barely kept pace with inflation since 2012.

“Forward-looking indicators suggested that spare capacity in the labour market would continue to decline gradually over 2018 and, as a consequence, wages growth was expected to rise gradually,” said the minutes from the Reserve Bank’s March board meeting.

“Jobs — especially full-time — are around as strong as possibly could be expected at this stage of the economic cycle,” said UBS economist George Tharenou. He suggested the combination of growing workforce participation and booming immigration were keeping a lid on wage growth.

“Wages growth will struggle to pick up much on a sustained basis,” said RBC economist ­­­­Su-Lin Ong, singling out the underemployment rate, which has risen and measures the share of workers who would like to work more hours. “At 8.4 per cent, it remains ­elevated by historical standards and consistent with ample slack in the labour market.’’

NSW enjoyed the biggest drop in its unemployment rate last month: from 5.1 per cent to 4.8 per cent, the lowest in the country. South Australia’s, the highest, rose to 6.3 per cent from 6.1 per cent in January.