Up & Coming Geoscientists - a sample of our AIG Honours Bursary Recipients

Geoscientist Employment in
Australia Continues its Slide
Andrew Waltho
AIG Councillor, Australian Institute of Geoscientists
Employment prospects for Australia’s
professional geoscientists declined
further in the last quarter of 2015
according to the results of the latest,
quarterly survey by the Australian Institute of
Geoscientists (AIG). At 31 December 2015,
the unemployment rate amongst Australian
Latest Employment Survey
geoscientists was 18.7% and the underemployment
rate was 23.4%. The combined
unemployment and under-employment rate of
42.1% was the highest recorded since the AIG
surveys commenced in mid-2009.
Less than 50% of self-employed
geoscientists were able to secure more than
one quarter of their desired workload, pointing
to a real unemployment rate of 31.1%, also
the highest rate recorded by the AIG surveys
to date and more than 10% higher than at the
peak of the global financial crisis of 2009.
Geoscientist employment declined in
every state, except NSW where it remained
static, and Victoria where unemployment
actually fell but under-employment increased.
The greatest increase in unemployment
was observed in Queensland, where
unemployment and underemployment rates
were more than 15% higher than those
observed in September 2015, followed by
South Australia.
© ingimage.com
Geoscientist unemployment and
under-employment in Australia
June 2009 – December 2015
AIG NEWS Issue 123 · February 2016 15