New Zealand’s jobless rate increased to 4.8% in the September 2024 quarter and other measures of the labour market also weakened as the economy contracted. Deb Brunning, a statistics manager at Statistics NZ, said the unemployment rate had been growing for the past two years and more people were not in the labour force. The number of people not in the job market has increased 57,000 in the past year. Those without work for three to six months were up 42% while people spending shorter periods jobless were relatively steady, Stats NZ said. There were 148,000 people out of work as of September, Statistics NZ said, up from 143,000 in June.

Source: Stuff November 06, 2024 13:15 UTC