Wages increase a little
Private sector wages growth was a little healthier, at 3.44 per cent over the year to September 2022.
It's important not to lose sight of the fact that this is coming off the lowest rate of growth in history in 2020 and 2021, of course, so a rebound was to be expected.
Public sector wages growth was a dismal 2.42 per cent over the year.
There are some awards which will land in the fourth quarter figures - but still it's a pretty underwhelming set of numbers.
Over the past three years private sector wages have increased only 7.1 per cent, while in the public sector the equivalent increase was only 6 per cent, before tax.
That's the lowest sustained rate of wage price growth we've seen.
Over the year, pre-tax wages growth increased by 3.1 per cent nationally, well below the prevailing rate of inflation.
At the state level most states saw and increase, with Tasmania and Queensland leading the way, but the two territories bringing up the rear, being held back by public sector wages.
Here are the figures by state and territory:
Australia's 3-year bound yield dropped back to 3.22 per cent, as it's become clear there is very little risk of a wages spiral.
Excluding visitor visas, annual net visa approvals leapt to more than 300,000 over the year to October, which is a record high.
Thus, although we saw some decent increases in wages in hospitality and retail wages this quarter, these numbers will begin to reset lower from next quarter onwards (particularly with fewer restrictions on how many hours international students can be employed for).
With the best of the labour force date behinds us, wages growth will probably peak at around 3½ per cent, which is broadly consistent with achieving the inflation target over time.
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Rental vacancies fell further in the September quarter to just 1.0 per cent, according to SQM Research.
Sydney's vacancy rate fell from 1.5 per cent to 1.3 per cent.
And in Melbourne, the vacancy rate fell from a revised 1.8 per cent to 1.5 per cent.
Asking rents increased by another 2 per cent in the capital cities in October, to be 24.4 per cent higher over the year.
The rental vacancies figures were revised for previous months to reflect the newly available Census data on rental properties.
SQM's full media release is here.
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The US Producer Price index saw year-on-year increases drop from 7.2 per cent to 6.7 per cent in October, being further confirmation that the inflationary "burp" is passing globally.
