In January Australian unemployment increased to 10.1% due to a growing workforce with not all new entrants finding jobs
In January 2025, Australian ‘real’ unemployment increased 78,000 to 1,620,000 (up 0.4% to 10.1% of the workforce) with more people looking for both part-time and full-time work.
The Australian workforce increased by 297,000 to a record high of 16,115,000 in January with both unemployment, up 78,000 to 1,620,000, and employment, up 219,000 to 14,495,000.
The January Roy Morgan Unemployment estimates were obtained by surveying an Australia-wide cross section of people aged 14+. A person is classified as unemployed if they are looking for work, no matter when. The ‘real’ unemployment rate is presented as a percentage of the workforce (employed & unemployed).
- Overall employment increased to a record high in January due to a spike in full-time employment:
Australian employment increased 219,000 to 14,495,000. This increase was driven by a jump in full-time employment as the new year started, up 306,000 to a new record high of 9,629,000 while part-time employment fell for a second straight month, down 87,000 to 4,866,000.
- Unemployment increased in January driven by a surge in people joining the workforce:
In January 1,620,000 Australians were unemployed (10.1% of the workforce, up 0.4%), an increase of 78,000 from December. The increase in unemployment was driven by similar rises in people looking for part-time work, up 36,000 to 837,000, and also people looking for full-time work, up 42,000 to 783,000.
- Overall unemployment and under-employment jumped 1.1% to 21.4% in January – the highest rate of unemployment and under-employment since January 2021, over four years ago:
In addition to the unemployed, a further 1.81 million Australians (11.3% of the workforce) were under-employed, i.e. working part-time but looking for more work, up 137,000 from December – a new record high level of under-employment. In total 3.43 million Australians (21.4% of the workforce) were either unemployed or under-employed in January – the highest combined figure since June 2020.
- Comparisons with two years ago, soon after COVID-19 restrictions ended in late 2022, show a rapidly increasing workforce is driving employment growth:
The workforce in January was a record high 16,115,000 (up 297,000 from December, and up a large 1,090,000 from two years ago) – comprised of a record high 14,495,000 employed Australians (up 219,000 from a month ago, and up a large 1,077,000 from two years ago).
ABS Comparison
Roy Morgan’s unemployment figure of 10.1% is clearly more than double the ABS estimate of 4.0% for December and is in line with the combined ABS unemployment and under-employment figure of 10.0%.
The latest monthly figures from the ABS indicate that the people working fewer hours in December 2024 due to illness, injury or sick leave was 530,700. Significantly, this is over 140,000 higher than the pre-pandemic average of the six years to December 2019 (383,850) – a difference of 146,850.
If this higher than pre-pandemic average of workers (146,850) who are working fewer hours due to illness, injury or sick leave is added to the combined ABS unemployment and under-employment figure of 1,523,000 we find a total of 1,669,850 people could be considered unemployed or under-employed, equivalent to 11.0% of the workforce.
Roy Morgan Unemployment & Under-employment (2019-2025)
Source: Roy Morgan Single Source January 2019 – January 2025. Average monthly interviews 5,000.
Note: Roy Morgan unemployment estimates are actual data while the ABS estimates are seasonally adjusted.
Michele Levine, CEO Roy Morgan, says the latest Roy Morgan employment estimates for January shows unemployment increasing to its highest for 18 months since August 2023 with an increasing workforce surging through 16 million Australians for the first time:
“The latest Roy Morgan employment estimates for January show total Australian unemployment or under-employment increasing significantly, up 215,000 to 3,433,000 (21.4% of the workforce, up 1.1%). This is the highest rate of overall unemployment and under-employment for over four years since January 2021 (21.7% of the workforce) during the COVID-19 pandemic.
“The increase was driven by a significant jump in the size of the workforce in January, up 297,000 to a record high of 16,115,000. Many of these new entrants to the workforce found jobs with employment increasing by 219,000 to 14,495,000. However, there were also a substantial number who didn’t find jobs with unemployment rising 78,000 to 1,620,000 (10.1% of the workforce, up 0.4%).
“In addition to rising unemployment, there was a large increase in under-employment, up 137,000 to a record high of 1,813,000 (11.3% of the workforce, up 0.7%). The underlying employment movements included an increase in full-time employment, up 306,000 to a record high of 9,629,000, which more than compensated for a softening in part-time employment, down 87,000 to 4,866,000.
“These trends show that while employment, and especially full-time employment, continues to grow strongly, not all Australians joining the workforce are finding gainful employment leading to rising metrics across the board – workforce, employment, and unemployment.
“Looking longer-term the employment trends since the last Federal Election in May 2022 show there’s been rapid population growth for over two years powering a sharp rise in the workforce and plenty of new jobs – but also rising unemployment as not everyone has been able to find a new job.
“Over the nearly three years since May 2022 the Australian population has increased by over 1.6 million – more people than live in Australia’s fifth largest city of Adelaide. This rate of population increase is much faster than the average annual population growth this century of 298,000 per year.
“An analysis of employment data since May 2022 shows the workforce increasing by over 1.7 million and employment increasing by around 1.25 million. As you can see, there is a gap there with employment increases not keeping pace with the growing workforce. That gap, of around 450,000, has led to a sustained rise in unemployment since the last Federal Election in May 2022.
“Looking back over this period, the rapidly inflating Australian population and workforce has led to a persistently high level of labour under-utilisation. Since July 2022 total unemployed and under-employed has been stuck above 2.5 million, and more recently, over the last two years since February 2023 total labour under-utilisation has been stuck above 2.6 million and averaged nearly 3 million since then.
“These figures show that as Prime Minister Anthony Albanese gets set to call a federal election in the next few weeks, or months, the Federal Government needs to provide greater policy clarity on how it will tackle the issues surrounding ‘cost of living’ as well as implementing policies to deal with the persistently high levels of unemployment and under-employment throughout the economy.”
This Roy Morgan survey on Australia’s unemployment and ‘under-employed’* is based on weekly interviews of 929,027 Australians aged 14 and over between December 2008 and January 2025 and includes 6,064 telephone and online interviews in January 2025. *The ‘under-employed’ are those people who are in part-time work or freelancers who are looking for more work.
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Margin of Error
The margin of error to be allowed for in any estimate depends mainly on the number of interviews on which it is based. Margin of error gives indications of the likely range within which estimates would be 95% likely to fall, expressed as the number of percentage points above or below the actual estimate. Allowance for design effects (such as stratification and weighting) should be made as appropriate.
| Sample Size | Percentage Estimate |
| 40% – 60% | 25% or 75% | 10% or 90% | 5% or 95% | |
| 1,000 | ±3.0 | ±2.7 | ±1.9 | ±1.3 |
| 5,000 | ±1.4 | ±1.2 | ±0.8 | ±0.6 |
| 7,500 | ±1.1 | ±1.0 | ±0.7 | ±0.5 |
| 10,000 | ±1.0 | ±0.9 | ±0.6 | ±0.4 |
| 20,000 | ±0.7 | ±0.6 | ±0.4 | ±0.3 |
| 50,000 | ±0.4 | ±0.4 | ±0.3 | ±0.2 |
