This data summarises employment and wage statistics in New Zealand.
Unemployment rate | Labour force | Average hourly earnings | |||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Date | (% s.a.) | Employed (000s s.a.) | Employed (y/y%) | Unemployed (000s s.a.) | Unemployed (y/y%) | ($) | (y/y%) |
Previous years: | |||||||
Dec 2020 | 4.9 | 2,728 | 0.6 | 141 | 21.9 | 34.36 | 4.2 |
Dec 2021 | 3.2 | 2,818 | 3.3 | 92 | -34.5 | 35.65 | 3.8 |
Quarterly: | |||||||
Mar 2022 | 3.2 | 2,817 | 2.5 | 94 | -29.2 | 36.24 | 4.9 |
Jun 2022 | 3.3 | 2,815 | 1.4 | 96 | -16.0 | 37.04 | 6.4 |
Sep 2022 | 3.3 | 2,851 | 1.2 | 97 | 0.5 | 37.93 | 7.5 |
Dec 2022 | 3.4 | 2,855 | 1.3 | 99 | 7.1 | 38.30 | 7.4 |
4 August 2021
Changes to the quarterly employment survey (QES) from the March 2021 quarter resulted in some series published in the M9 table being discontinued. These series have now been replaced with the new equivalent series published by Stats NZ. For more information see Redesign of the quarterly employment survey.
The HLFS provides New Zealand's official employment and unemployment statistics. The target population is the civilian, usually resident, non-institutionalised population aged 15 years and over.
The labour force category (employed, unemployed, not in the labour force) to which a person is assigned depends on their actual activity during a survey reference week.
The QES provides statistics on average hourly earnings. The target population is economically significant enterprises in surveyed industries.
QES data relates to a single reference week, which is the week ending on, or immediately before, the 20th of the middle month of the quarter.
The labour cost index (LCI) measures changes in salary and wage rates for a fixed quantity and quality of labour input. Service increments, merit promotions and increases (or decreases) relating to performance of the individual employee are not included in the index.
The LCI covers jobs filled by paid employees in all occupations and in all industries except private households employing staff.
Quarterly
We publish the HLFS, QES and LCI within six weeks after the end of the reference quarter.
The statistics release calendar provides a long-term plan of scheduled releases. We update and release the calendar on the first working day of the month.
View the statistics release calendar
We reproduced the data with the permission of Statistics New Zealand.
We generally publish revisions when we update and release a table. New or revised data is in bold font.
We sourced data from Statistics New Zealand.
The number of unemployed people expressed as a percentage of the labour force.
People in the working-age population who, during the reference week, did one of the following:
All people in the working-age population who during the reference week were without a paid job, available for work, and had either actively sought work in the past four weeks ending with the reference week, or had a new job to start within the next four weeks.
Any person in the working-age population who is neither employed nor unemployed. For example, this residual category includes people who:
The usually resident, non-institutionalised, civilian population of New Zealand aged 15 years and over.
The total labour force expressed as a percentage of the working-age population
The LCI measures changes in salary and wage rates for a fixed quantity and quality of labour input.
Service increments, merit promotions and increases (or decreases) relating to performance of the individual employee are not shown in the index.
The salary and wage rates component of the LCI measures movements in base salary, ordinary time wage rates and overtime wage rates.
The LCI has an index reference period of the June 2009 quarter (=1000).
Total ordinary and overtime pay for the reference week divided by the total paid hours recorded for the week.
Changes in average hourly earnings can mean a pay rise or an increase or decrease in the number of hours worked in a higher or lower paying industry.
Symbol or convention | Definition |
---|---|
0 | Zero or value rounded to zero |
- | Not applicable |
.. | Not available |
bold | Revised/new |
italics | Provisional |
Light grey background | Historical |
View other related Economic Indicators tables.