Indigenous Employment 1981–2021

Abstract

There is a significant body of research which attempts to quantify rates of Indigenous employment. However, previous estimates offer an often-inconsistent depiction across recent decades, with the specifications of analysis both by researchers and government changing, and the data environment developing. An oversight in previous estimations has been failing to analyse Indigenous employment in the context of the machinations of the broader labour market, such as the increase of women in the workforce, changing education rates, and age profiles of employment. This paper produces the largest scale estimation of Indigenous employment to date, across the period of 1981–2021, using nine iterations of 5-yearly Census data. This analysis reaffirms the associations between factors such as geography and education with rates of employment but highlights the significant extent to which the increase of Indigenous women in the workforce has contributed to the overall increase in Indigenous employment. Overall, this paper provides a comprehensive view of the Indigenous labour market over a 40-year period in the context of the Australian labour market as a whole. Inevitably, the findings of this paper point to a lingering stagnation in employment in key areas, and the crucial need for more insightful and relevant data beyond the Census