O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay! Fresh off the email from the Australian Bureau of Statistics: Labour Force, Australia, July 2020.

The headline? “Employment and hours worked rose in July.”

The reality? “The number of unemployed people rose by nearly 16,000 between June and July. For the first time there were more than one million people out of work, available to work and actively looking for work.”

Here’s the release, in all its glory:

And what about that: “The July data provides insight into the Australian labour market during Stage 3 restrictions in Victoria. The August Labour Force data will provide the first indication of the impact of Stage 4 restrictions.”

Such delicate, delicious understatement, hey?

[Hums] We’ve only just begun…

Oh. And don’t forget these are effectively meaningless numbers as they include all the poor bastards hanging on by their fingernails on JobKeeper. Exclude them and that’s a far more accurate picture of unemployment.