STEPHEN JOHNSON: Record-low number of Australians changing jobs as labour market slows

A record low proportion of Australians are switching jobs in a sign that workers are scared of being retrenched during a cost-of-living crisis and an AI revolution.

A million Australians changed jobs in the year to February 2026, making up just 7.2 per cent of the labour force or the lowest number in Australian Bureau of Statistics data going back to 1972.

This marked a sharp drop from 7.7 per cent from February 2025.

As recently as 2023, during the global “great resignation” phenomenon, almost one in 10 workers had switched jobs that year but that rate has been falling since 2024.

Fears about another interest rate rise during a cost-of-living crisis were especially discouraging workers paying off high mortgage and bank debt levels from seeking alternative employment, University of Sydney labour market researcher Professor John Buchanan said.

“They’re uncertain and scared, totally,” he told The Nightly.

“With an uncertain economic outlook and with a high level of personal debt, the risks of something going wrong if you move are high.

“You’re also seeing a lot of talk about threats to technological employment with automation and AI, it’s a threat lurking in the background, and the war in the Middle East is really putting huge uncertainty on the future of inflation and interest rates.”

Just 7.1 per cent of women and working-age girls switched jobs in the year to February 2026, down from 7.9 per cent a year earlier.

By comparison, the male rate of job switching fell to 7.4 per cent from 7.6 per cent.

Male-dominated jobs had the highest rate of job switching with 9.5 per cent of machinery operators and drivers switching jobs, up from 9.3 per cent the previous year.

Female-dominated work had the biggest fall in job switching, with 7.2 per cent of community and personal service workers changing roles, down from 9 per cent previously.

Australia’s most powerful were also the least likely to switch with 5.3 per cent of managers changing, down from 5.7 per cent.

Of the 14.5 million people with a job, more than half or 56 per cent had held their current position for less than five years.

The overall rate of job switching was occurring during a year that saw unemployment climb from 4.1 per cent to a four-year high of 4.5 per cent that had previously been reached during COVID lockdowns in Sydney and Melbourne.

The jobless rate of 4.4 per cent during June was still at the level considered by economists to be full employment where unemployment isn’t fuelling wage demands that add to inflation.

But one in two or 48 per cent of part-time workers wanted more hours, the ABS revealed on Friday.

Prof. Buchanan noted in a paper that youth unemployment is much higher than overall unemployment at 10.2 per cent while the underemployment rate for those aged 15-24 was even higher at 14.4 per cent where those wanting more hours were unable to get it.

Youth unemployment is 3.3 times the jobless level for those aged 25 and over, which is well above the 2.76 long-run average since the ABS began publishing monthly labour force data in 1978.

The record-low job switching is also coinciding with surveys showing consumer sentiment at record lows.

“This is tangible evidence that it’s not just an attitude,” he said.