The vast majority of Australia’s casual workforce, prefer that style of work, relishing the flexibility it provides.
New Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) data shows three-quarters of casual employees currently preferred casual employment.
ABS Head of Labour statistics David Taylor said for half of those, flexibility in hours was the main reason the preferred casual work.
“The higher hourly pay rate was the main reason for almost a quarter of people preferring casual employment.” Mr Taylor said.
“For the one-quarter of casual employees who would prefer a non-casual job, the most common reasons were to have paid leave entitlements or have more secure employment.”
He said there were more than 2.5 million employees without paid holiday or sick leave entitlements, a commonly used measure of casual workers, in August 2024.
“This represents 22 percent of all employees and 18 percent of all employed people.”
Mr Taylor said casual employment was particularly impacted by the pandemic, falling from around 25 percent of employees to under 21 per cent in 2020.
“While the share of casual employees subsequently rose to almost 24 percent between 2020 and 2022, it has since dropped to just over 22 percent of all employees in August 2024.”
He said working from home was still more common among Australians after the pandemic, but slightly less than it was a year ago.
“Our latest data, for August 2024, shows that 36 percent of Australians usually work from home.
“While this was slightly down from 37 per cent in 2023, it was still four percentage points above the pre-pandemic level. This shows that many of the changes in working arrangements have continued beyond the pandemic.”
Mr Taylor said the main reasons people usually worked from home was to work more flexibly or choose their own hours, followed by operating a business from home or having a home-based job.
Access the full data set: Characteristics of Employment, Australia
