The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) released of the latest labour force data today (November 17, 2022) – Labour Force, Australia – for October 2022. The labour market improveds somewhat in October 2022 with employment rising by 32,200 (0.2 per cent) on the back of strong full-time employment growth. With the sluggish labour force growth (as a result of below-average growth in the working age population) and an unchanged participation rate, the jobs growth saw unemployment and the official unemployment rate both decline. The full-time jobs growth also reduced underemployment. However, the underlying (‘What-if’) unemployment rate is closer to 6.1 per cent rather than the official rate of 3.4 per cent. There are still 1313.8 thousand Australian workers without work in one way or another (officially unemployed or underemployed). The only reason the unemployment rate is so low is because the underlying population growth remains low after the border closures over the last two years. But that is changing as immigration increases.