• Unemployment
• Employment
• Median hourly earnings
• Workplace injury claims
• Satisfaction with work-life balance

Unemployment

Relevance

This is a key indicator of labour market outcomes and the lack of access to employment. The unemployment rate is an important reflection of overall economic conditions and gives some sense of the ease with which people are able to move into employment.

Current level and trends

In 2005, 3.7 percent of the labour force (or 79,000 people) were unemployed and actively seeking work. The unemployment rate has declined steadily since 1998 and is considerably lower than the peak rate of 10.4 percent in 1992 (176,000 people unemployed). The 2005 unemployment rate was lower than the rate of 4.1 percent in 1986 when records began (70,000 people unemployed).

In 2005, 22 percent of the surveyed unemployed who specified their duration of unemployment had been unemployed for a continuous period of six months or more, a decline from 23 percent in 2004. The 2005 level of long-term unemployment was just under that recorded in 1986 (23 percent) and substantially lower than the peak of 53 percent in 1992.

Figure PW1.1 Unemployment rate, 1986–2005

Source: Statistics New Zealand, Household Labour Force Survey

Age and sex differences

Unemployment rates among different age groups have followed similar trends but the level among those aged 15–24 years (9.4 percent in 2005) has been consistently more than twice the rate for older groups. This group made up 44 percent of all unemployed in 2005. Rates were higher for males than females in the peak years of unemployment but, more recently, females have had slightly higher unemployment rates than males.

Table PW1.1 Unemployment rates (%), by age and sex, selected years, 1986–2005

Source: Statistics New Zealand, Household Labour Force Survey
Note: Average for December years

Ethnic differences

For European, Māori and Pacific peoples, unemployment rates in 2005 were the lowest recorded since 1986.

The Māori unemployment rate rose from 11.3 percent in 1986 to a peak of 25.4 percent in 1992 and had fallen to 8.6 percent by 2005. Between 1986 and 1991, the unemployment rate for Pacific peoples rose from 6.6 percent to 28 percent, the highest rate for any ethnic group. The Pacific peoples’ unemployment rate has declined more than that of Māori since the mid-1990s and was 6.1 percent in 2005, lower than the rate in 1986.

The unemployment rate is lowest among people of European ethnicity. Their unemployment rate rose from 3.3 percent in 1986 to a peak of 7.9 percent in 1992 and had dropped to 2.6 percent by 2005. The unemployment rate of the Other ethnic group category (made up mainly of Asians, but includes many recent migrants) increased from 3.7 percent in 1986 to 14.8 percent in 1992, and was still relatively high at 6.4 percent in 2005.

Figure PW1.2 Unemployment rate, by ethnic group, 1986–2005

Source: Statistics New Zealand, Household Labour Force Survey
Note: Other includes Asian

International comparison

In 2005, out of 26 OECD countries, New Zealand ranked first equal (with South Korea) with a standardised unemployment rate of 3.7 percent, compared with the OECD average of 6.6 percent. Since the mid-1980s, New Zealand's unemployment rate relative to other OECD countries has ranged from one of the lowest (fifth in 1986 with a rate of 4.1 percent) to one of the highest (17th in 1992 with a rate of 10.3 percent). The New Zealand unemployment rate in 2005 was lower than those of Japan (4.4 percent), the United Kingdom (4.7 percent), the United States and Australia (each 5.1 percent) and Canada (6.8 percent).⁵⁰ In 2004, New Zealand ranked sixth in terms of the proportion of the unemployed who had been unemployed for six months or longer.⁵¹