A record number of people are working more than one job
The past 2 years has seen a surge in the number of people working multiple jobs
There are now nearly 900,000 Australians who are working more than one job in order to make ends meet.
The latest Labour Account figures from the ABS shows that in June this year 6.5% of all employed were working multiple jobs. These 898,900 workers is a massive 14.3% increase on the 786,900 multiple job holders at the end of 2019.
The pandemic has seen a strong shift towards people having to work more than one job, and the increased cost of living in the past year has further exacerbated the situation.
With wages growth lagging well below inflation, for an increasing number of people the only way to pay the bills is to take another job.
Worse still, given in June there were 1,009,308 jobs which were not classed as the “main job” that means that there are likely over 100,000 who are working 3 or more jobs just to get by.
Until the bargaining system is fixed so that workers can get a fair reward, and true compensation for rising prices, we can only expect the number of people working multiple jobs to increase.
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