WELLINGTON, Aug. 6 (Xinhua) -- New Zealand's unemployment rate fell to 3.9 percent in the June 2019 quarter, down from 4.2 percent in the March 2019 quarter, the statistics department Stats NZ said on Tuesday.
This is the lowest rate since the June 2008 quarter, with 3.8 percent unemployment rate.
The fall in the latest quarter reflected a decreasing number of unemployed people, which was down 7,000, bringing the total number of unemployed to 109,000. This fall was driven by 4,000 fewer unemployed men, Stats NZ said.
The Maori unemployment rate was 7.7 percent in the June 2019 quarter, down from 9.4 percent last year. This reflects a decrease in the number of unemployed Maori, which was down 6,400, labor market and household statistics senior manager Sean Broughton said in a statement.
This is the lowest Maori unemployment rate since the June 2008 quarter, when it was 7.2 percent, Broughton said.
In the June 2019 quarter, the underutilization rate fell to 11 percent, down from 11.3 percent last quarter. This is the lowest underutilization rate since the September 2008 quarter, when it was 10.5 percent, statistics show.
The underutilization rate provides a broader measure of spare capacity or slack in New Zealand's labor market.
Overall, the number of people who were underutilized fell by 7,000, to 317,000 in the June 2019 quarter. The fall in underutilization was driven by women, which was down 9,000, while the number of underutilized men increased by 2,000, Broughton said.
The employment rate rose to 67.7 percent in the June 2019 quarter, up from 67.5 percent last quarter, according to Stats NZ.
Over the year, wages within the quarterly employment survey also grew. Average ordinary time hourly earnings increased to 32.37 NZ dollars (21.17 U.S. dollars), up 4.4 percent. This is the largest percentage increase in average ordinary time hourly earnings since June 2009, when it was 4.7 percent, it said.
