The average weekly ordinary time earnings for full-time adults in Australia in May 2019 was $1,634 (trend), according to new Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) figures released today.
Average full-time earnings increased by $27 (1.7 per cent) over the previous six months and by $48 over the year (3.0 per cent).
Bruce Hockman, Chief Economist at the ABS, said: “This latest compositional data points to a pick up in average earnings growth.”
Mr Hockman said that this latest data comes after a period of low growth in average weekly earnings, which partly reflected the growing number of lower earning workers in the services sector, including aged care, childcare and disability care workers.
Over the past five years, average full-time earnings remained highest in the ACT ($1,811) and Western Australia ($1,780), and lowest in Tasmania ($1,420) and South Australia ($1,475). The highest increases in average full-time earnings over the five years were in the Northern Territory (18.1 per cent) and Victoria (16.0 per cent), which were both well above the increase in the average for Australia (12.3 per cent).
