Australia Unemployment Rate Steady At 4.1%

(RTTNews) - Australia's unemployment rate remained unchanged in April and employment increased sharply, data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics showed on Thursday.

The jobless rate remained unchanged at 4.1 percent in April, in line with expectations. Employment increased sharply by 89,000 from the previous month. Economists had expected only an increase of 20,900 for April.

At the same time, the number of unemployed increased by 6,300 in April.

The strong growth in employment led to a rise in the employment-to-population ratio of 0.3 percentage points to 64.4 percent in April, just below the record high of 64.5 percent seen in January, ABS head of labour statistics Sean Crick said.