Some interesting comments here. The Australian public believe that 5.4 per cent is the real unemployment figure when in fact its a methodological fantasy constructed to fit an international benchmark. Fat lot of good that's going to do.

Notions that most people 'don't want to work more hours' is fanciful if you ask people in the JSAs and training orgs. One of the reasons why it is very hard to get a job is because there aren't any jobs. The Government knows this and most of the people on this thread I suggest know this as well. Population increases plus waves of school leavers and graduates have flooded the nations capability to create new jobs to keep up with demand.

I suggest many people have simply given up.

In reply to rehctub, if you can't drop by to collect the book, perhaps you could send a stamped, self-addressed envelope so that I can pop a copy in the mail. The book can be posted as a large letter, less than 500 g and less than 2 cm thick - normal postage within Australia $2.90.
This offer of a complimentary copy of Your Future in Your Hands is also open to any OLO subscriber. My postal address is GPO Box 2927 Brisbane 4001.

Butch Doesn't understand or doesn't want to.
People simply Give up looking for a job, in other words they are not fair dinkum at obtaining a job. A good way to employment is through voluntary labor.
Why are miners screaming for labour continuously.
The highest unemployment is in QLD, not surprising, is it.
If you can't accept a world standard, blame Howard he put it there.

Cheryl

The ABS includes a question on whether people want more hours in its regular labour force survey. About a quarter of part-timers report that they do want more hours (the under-employed), but most do not:

http://www.abs.gov.au/ausstats/abs@.nsf/Latestproducts/6265.0Main%20Features4Sep%202011?opendocument&tabname=Summary&prodno=6265.0&issue=Sep%202011&num=&view=

As I read it, there are three different questions under discussion on this thread

1. Does the inclusion of people working only a few hours a week significant affect the measured unemployment rate?
2. Does Australia have a significant level of under-employment that is not captured in the in the standard definition of unemployment?
3. Do 1) and 2) constitute an effort by government to conceal the true extend of unemployment?

I think that the answer to 1) and 3) is ‘no’, the answer to 2) is ‘yes’.

It is hard to sustain the argument that the government is trying to conceal the true extent of unemployment, given that it publishes under-employment estimates as part of its standard labour force release every month.

Furthermore, not all of the oddities in the unemployment data act to make the labour force data look positive. For example, I guess many people world not consider a 15-year old in full-time schooling looking for weekend work at a local supermarket as “unemployed”, but the ABS counts them as so. In fact, more than 60,000 (about 10%) of the unemployed are people aged 15-19 in full-time education looking for part-time work, with a further 17,000 full-time students aged 20-24 looking for part-time work.

(data based on annual average in the year to November 2011 – see Table 03a here .
http://www.abs.gov.au/AUSSTATS/abs@.nsf/DetailsPage/6291.0.55.001Nov%202012?OpenDocument)

I take your point Rhian,

but citing the figures from the link, we have "722,600 people working part-time, but would prefer more hours and were available to start work with more hours ..."

I don't reckon that satisfies your claim that most people working part time are content with their hours. They are not content.

Many are contractors or working casually. Some do a few hours a week and just scrape by. The ACTU did a study on this last year (contract/casual workers) and the problems are considerable - not the least being that the majority of Australians simply think the nation is cruising at 5.4 unemployment when in effect it is dragging effective unemployment at 10-12 percent.

Cheryl

The 722,600 part-timers wanting longer hours and available to work, represent 21% of the 3.4 million total part-timers. There were also 92,100 people who would prefer longer hours but were not available to work them, for a total of 24% of part-timers wanting longer hours - “about a quarter”, as I said.

About half of these (445,200, or 13% of all part-timers) would prefer full-time work.

I agree that this is a significant social and economic issue, but I don’t think there is a conspiracy to conceal it from the general public.