Jobs and Skills Australia has released the new Regional Labour Market Indicator (RLMI).
The RLMI combines key labour market indicators into a single, easy-to-understand summary measure of relative regional performance.
The RLMI can assist by:
- bringing together multiple indicators for a full picture
- combining an employee and employer perspective
- categorising regions from ‘poor’ to ‘strong’, relative to the national average.
An interactive map is also available to discover and compare labour market conditions across Australia.
Measuring labour market performance across regions is a complex task and can pose a number of challenges, including:
- Multiple indicators: Identifying common trends across separate indicators can be difficult.
- Volatile data: Regional data can be unreliable due to small sample size.
March 2024 results
Results show that while most regions have benefited from strong labour market conditions, there are still big differences between areas.
- The city advantage: 74% of regions rated 'strong' or 'above average' are in cities.
- Regional challenges: 70% of regions rated 'below average' or 'poor' are in regional or remote areas.
This highlights the extra difficulties faced by employers and jobseekers in regional and remote areas compared to those in cities.
In focus: Greater Sydney
In the results, we highlight the labour market advantage seen in Greater Sydney. For example:
- 7 of the 14 strongest regions in Australia are in Greater Sydney
- Only 2 out of 15 regions in Greater Sydney are rated 'below average' or 'poor'.
To read more about this and more, see the RLMI webpage.
