12.09.201403:31:28UTC+00Australia's high jobs numbers a blip not a trend says analysts

Analysts are warning that the major improvement recorded in Australia’s labor market may be more of a statistical deviation than a sign of rosier things to come.

The Australian Bureau of Statistics showed in a report yesterday that unemployment in the country fell from a 12 year high of 6.4% in July to 6.1% in August on the back of 121,000 new employees which brought the total number of jobs to 11.7 million. Much of the improvement could be credited to the number of men and women going into part time jobs, reflecting a shift towards casual work. Based on the official statistics, the number of unemployed Australians decreased by 33,500 to 755,100.

Strategist Andrew Lilley from USB described the reports with disbelief saying that “This would be equivalent to the US creating 1.5m jobs in its monthly non-farm payrolls. This must be a sampling error.” The sentiment was echoed by ANZ Bank’s senior economist, Riki Polygenis, who suggested that the “exceptionally large” increase in part time workers could be a result of changes made in the methodology of the survey.

Chief economist Alan Oster from National Australia Bank admitted that the report could have been mixed with “statistical noise” and advised market participants to be cautious, but also claimed that part time work in Australia has recently grown faster than full time work.

Australia’s economy is currently on a cool down as it sees the surge in investments towards its mining industry end.The decade long period helped push up wages in the country as well as allowing the Australian dollar to rise against many major currencies.