Australia’s workforce has become more settled, with the amount of people changing jobs back to pre-COVID levels.
The latest job mobility data, released today by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS), has shown a fall in the rate for the first time in three years.
ABS Head of Labour Statistics Bjorn Jarvis said in the 12 months to February 2024, around 8 percent of employed people, or 1.1 million people, changed their employer or business.
“This was down 1.5 percent from 9.6 percent in February 2023 and back to around what we typically saw during the five years leading up to the COVID-19 pandemic,” Mr Jarvis said.
The data showed that younger workers were more mobile than older workers, with 13 percent of people aged 15 to 24 years changing jobs.
“However, youth job mobility was noticeably lower than the high of 15.9 percent we saw in 2022 during the pandemic, and well below rates of more than 20 per cent seen 20 years ago,” Mr Jarvis said.
In Queensland, the job mobility rate fell to 8.5 percent, which was still among the highest in country, similar to Western Australia and Tasmania (both 8.7 percent).
The Australian Capital Territory (10.6 percent) boasted the highest rate in the nation, but also recorded the largest drop of 1.8 percent, down from 12.4 percent.
Job mobility deceased in most industries, with the largest decreases in:
- Arts and Recreation Services (11.6 percent to 6.2 percent).
- Transport, postal and warehousing (11.6 percent to 7 percent).
- Financial and Insurance Services (9.9 percent to 5.4 percent).
