Unemployment falls and the Australian job market remains competitive

The latest figures from the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) show that unemployment fell across the last quarter of 2014.

There's no denying that as a positive, however, the general state of the Australian job market is still very much in the balance. The quarterly vacancy figures show – put simply – that there aren't enough open roles across the country to make a greater dent in the current unemployment figure – which stands at just over 770,000.

Seasonally adjusted unemployment

The seasonally adjusted unemployment rate is particularly notable given the drop it experienced – from 6.2 to 6.1 per cent. While it may sound inconsequential, that is in fact the biggest month-to-month drop for some two years.

However, there is a good chance that the 24 month trend being bucked is an anomaly. The eyes of analysts will be firmly fixed on the next few rounds of ABS figures to see if this merely represents some statistical noise or something which points to a bigger, long-term trend.

Tough job market

By profession, labourers, technicians, trade workers and machinery operators are likely to find the current job market tough. While that group of jobs currently account for 31 per cent of the entire Australian work force, only 25 per cent of the available positions across the country are in those fields, according to November figures from the Department of Employment.

With the job market currently in a relatively precarious position, it's imperative to not only find the right staff, but also keep them happy in the long run.

Using recruitment software such as FastTrack360 can make that process easy. With the economic conditions far from perfect, there's no better time to implement a productivity solution to support the interests and sustainability of any ongoing business.

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