Australian wages become a ward of the state

Thursday 14 November 2019

Yesterday’s labour price index for the September quarter, released by the ABS, confirmed that the public sector is driving wage growth across the Australian economy:

As shown above, public sector wages grew by 2.5% in the year to September, versus a 2.2% increase across the private sector.

This continues a long-running trend, with real public sector wages growing by 14.9% since June 2002, versus growth of only 8.3% across the private sector:

The full text of this article is available to MacroBusiness subscribers

$1 for your first month, then:

$24.99 / month

$249 / year

Cancel at any time through our billing provider, Stripe

About the author

Leith van Onselen is Chief Economist at the MB Fund and MB Super. He is also a co-founder of MacroBusiness. Leith has previously worked at the Australian Treasury, Victorian Treasury and Goldman Sachs.