Treasurer Jim Chalmers said unemployment is expected to rise further.Credit:Alex Ellinghausen
For the second successive month,the number of people holding down a job has fallen. Nationally,the country has shed 31,400 jobs since November,but almost all the pain has been felt in the nation’s two largest states.
NSW lost 22,000 jobs over the period,despite its unemployment rate falling to 3.1 per cent while Victoria has lost 41,300 jobs,which has pushed its unemployment rate to 4 per cent.
Chalmers said the rise in unemployment was an expected consequence of the global economic turmoil and rising interest rates.
“As we enter what we expect will be a really difficult year for the economy and for our people,clearly,the prospects for a slowing economy and higher inflation than we’d like for longer than we’d like,obviously,that’s a concern,” he said.
The Reserve Bank has raised interest rates to 3.35 per cent over nine consecutive meetings in its fight against high inflation,which reached a 32-year high of 7.8 per cent in December.
RBA governor Philip Lowe will face parliament’s economics committee for another three hours of questioning on Friday after the central bank last week signalled that there would be more interest rate rises in coming months as it works to ensure inflation does not stay high for too long.