Payroll jobs fully recovered before seasonal drop: Australia

Payroll jobs had recovered to pre-COVID levels by early December 2020, according to figures released by the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) today.

Bjorn Jarvis, head of Labour Statistics at the ABS, said: “Early to mid-December is a seasonal peak for jobs each year. The latest data shows that, at that point, payroll jobs had increased back to the level of mid-March.

“The data also shows the seasonal fall in payroll jobs later in December, following a similar seasonal pattern to last year, before the start of the pandemic.

“This also aligns with what we see in Labour Force statistics each year, particular in hours worked through December and January.”

a. Data for 2019 are presented for visual comparison only, as they have not been fully quality assured and are affected by under-coverage and year-end reporting variability.

Nationally, payroll jobs fell 5.5 per cent across the fortnight to 2 January 2021 and were 6.1 per cent below mid-March 2020.

/ABS Public Release. View in full here.