Demand for workers continues to ease

The intense demand for workers that organisations have had for quite some time is finally easing, meaning the stresses of talent shortages may finally be behind us.

Data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) revealed that job vacancies are down 38,000 since May, bringing the total number of vacancies to 390,000.

Kate Lamb, ABS head of labour statistics, commented: “The number of job vacancies fell by around 9 per cent between May and August and has dropped by 18 per cent from the peak in May 2022.”

This decline in worker demand could be the beginning of the end for talent shortages. Coinciding with this data is the rise of unemployment, which further supports this claim. According to ABS, unemployment in Australia is currently sitting at 3.7 per cent.

“Demand for workers eased again in August for the fifth straight quarter. This coincided with an increase in the unemployment rate over the three months to August,” Ms Lamb said.

However, despite these trends, the talent market is still much more volatile than it was before the pandemic, indicating that we’re far from back to normal.

“While these indicators are no longer at historical levels, both are still showing that the labour market is tighter than it was before the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Job vacancies were still around 72 per cent higher than they were in February 2020. That’s still around 160,000 more jobs that employers are looking for people to fill, as part of a pool of almost 400,000 vacancies,” Ms Lamb explained.

“The percentage of businesses reporting at least one vacancy also fell from 25 per cent in May to 22 per cent in August. However, this was still double what it was in February 2020 at 11 per cent.”

As far as specific industries, ABS revealed that the only industry to have vacancies lower than February 2020 was financial and insurance services, down 5.2 per cent. Meanwhile, every other industry saw higher vacancies, with arts and recreation services seeing the most dramatic difference of 265.6 per cent. Accommodation and food services followed at 181 per cent, and electricity, gas, water and waste services at 131.5 per cent.

While we’re clearly far from the norm, we could be on the right track. Both the public and private sectors saw a decrease in job vacancies over the August quarter, falling by 6 per cent and 9 per cent, respectively.

The ACT was the hardest hit area, seeing vacancies drop by 8 per cent on average. Meanwhile, Queensland was the only state to grow, climbing by 4 per cent.