Employment surged 2.4% from the first quarter, when it gained 1.2%, Statistics New Zealand reported Wednesday in Wellington.
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In unadjusted terms, unemployment was down from a year ago across many North Island regions, including Auckland, which had an unemployment rate of 4.7 per cent in the June 2016 quarter.
New Zealand’s unemployment rate fell more than expected in the second quarter as Statistics New Zealand adopted a new way of measuring the labour market to bring the country in line with global practices, and while a growing economy continued to support jobs growth.
Quarter-on-quarter employment growth was 2.4 per cent while the participation rate was 69.7 per cent. Economists polled by Reuters had forecast an unemployment rate of 5.3 per cent and employment growth of 0.6 per cent.
“The unemployment rate is trending lower, but there is still spare capacity there that’s weighing on wage growth”, he said.
Including those workers and the number who are unemployed by traditional measures, the number of people who have less employment than they want is 342,000 or 12.7 per cent of the labour market. This is the lowest rate for the Auckland region since the September 2008 quarter (when it was 4.1 percent).
The June 2016 quarter results indicate that 66.2 percent of the working-age population were employed.
The figures showed total hours worked rose a seasonally adjusted 2.5 percent in the quarter to 82.9 million hours in an average week. Key changes to the survey included: improved questions about undertaking paid work, which now identify more self-employed people; and the inclusion of members of the armed forces who live in private dwellings. “The latest estimates are more in line with the current state of the labour market”.
The jobless rate declined to a seasonally adjusted 5.1 percent or 131,000 people, in the June quarter from a revised 5.2 percent rate in March, the government department said in a statement.
Because of survey changes, comparisons with preceding periods can not be made, ASB chief economist Nick Tuffley said.
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ANZ senior economist Phil Borkin said the data needed to be treated with care, but the labour market was in good shape.
