Jobless Rate Steady Before RBA Meet Despite Hiring Surge

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Australia’s unemployment rate has stayed steady at 4.1%, even as nearly 90,000 people found work last month — a surprising result just days before the Reserve Bank is expected to cut interest rates.

The Australian Bureau of Statistics released the new jobs data this morning, and it shows a job market that's stronger than expected. In April, 89,000 jobs were created — way above what economists had forecast. Of those, 59,500 were full-time and 29,500 were part-time.

Nine’s finance editor, Chris Kohler, summed it up:

“It’s a bit of a split. The unemployment rate held steady — that was expected. But the number of new jobs? That’s a real surprise. Much stronger than anyone thought.”

Despite the surge in hiring, economists say it probably won’t derail an interest rate cut next Tuesday. The market still has a 96% expectation that the Reserve Bank of Australia (RBA) will lower the cash rate by 25 basis points.

But this unexpected jobs boost could make the RBA more cautious about additional cuts later in the year.

“If the labour market keeps showing this kind of strength, we might be looking at three cuts instead of four for the rest of 2025,” Kohler explained. “And if the RBA does cut rates next week, expect some careful, measured words from Governor Michelle Bullock.”

There was another standout figure in the report: Women made up the bulk of new hires, accounting for 65,000 of the 89,000 jobs created. For men, it was 24,000.

Also worth noting: the national participation rate ticked up by 0.3%, with strong growth in the 35–44 age group.

“The participation rate for people aged 35 to 44 had the largest annual growth, up 1.9 percentage points to 88.3%,” said ABS head of labour statistics Sean Crick.

So while the jobless rate hasn’t budged, the economy is clearly still generating jobs — and plenty of them. The real question now is how the Reserve Bank will read the room next week.

Stay tuned with Aus News Lanka – the leading platform for news for Australians.