Nearly a third of Australians are working from home and are doing so mostly to catch up on work. The data released yesterday from the Australian Bureau of Statistics has also revealed that while the level of casualisation in the workforce remains lower than it was at the start of the century, it has been rising over the past four years, and despite protestations to the contrary, working Monday to Friday remains the overwhelming norm.
One of the big changes in work over the past 20 years or so has been the rise in part-time employment. Partly this has been due to the increase in women’s participation, but it has also been driven by the increase in the percentage of men working part-time.
While there are some swing and roundabouts of that rise – as I have noted previously – one of the common concerns is that with the shift to part-time work will also come a shift towards greater numbers of people working in casual employment.
Given over half of those employed part-time were employed without leave entitlements (the standard definition of casual workers), this would seem to not be an unfair concern:
However, the latest “characteristics of employment” data released by the ABS shows that 24.3% of employees in 2015 were casual workers – well down on the 26.8% level ten years ago, but up slightly from the 23.7% in 2012:
As ever, women are much more likely to be casual workers than are men. While 27.1% of women are casual employees, just 21.6% of men are. However, since 2008 the level of women casual workers has fallen, while for men it has become more common.
One possible reason for the lack of increase in the level of casual workers, despite the increase in part-time work is that while women are more likely to be employed part-time, women part-time workers are less likely than their male counterparts to be employed under casual conditions. Seventy percent of men working part-time were doing so as casual workers, compared to just 47% of women part-time employees.
The level of casual work within the economy also took a big drop in 2008 due to the impact of the GFC and the drop in the level of youth workers in the economy.
Youth workers are much more likely to be employed as casual than others workers, and young women very much more so:
Seventy nine percent of women aged 15-19 work casually, compared to 67% of similar aged men. This is not necessarily a bad thing – it’s highly likely that such workers are also attending some form of education. And the sharp drop off with age does not suggest casual work as a youth necessarily leads to it being an ongoing situation.
That women are more likely to work in casual arrangements is also linked to the industries in which they work.
Women account for over half of employees in the retail, accommodation and food, real estate, and admin and support industries – all of which are among those industries with the highest percentage of casual workers:
Only the agriculture and fishing industry, which has just 30% of women workers, is a high-male/high-casual industry – driven mostly by the seasonal nature of much of the work.
But the prevalence of casual work in the retail trade and the accommodation and food services industries is clear when you consider that while the accommodation industry accounts for 7% of all employees it accounts for 20% of all casual workers. Similarly the retail trade industry accounts for 11% of employees but 17% of casuals:
By contrast the public administration industry reveals that most public servants are not casual workers. They account for 7% of all employees but just 3% of all casuals.
While casual workers are without leave entitlements they do at least appear to work less from home than other workers.
Nearly a third of all Australian workers usually work from home. This number is somewhat skewed by the large proportion of the owners of businesses who do so. Seventy three percent of the 810,000 owner/managers of incorporated businesses work from home, and 67% of the 1.26m owners of unincorporated business do so as well.
But while 2.056m employees work from home, a greater proportion of these are those with ongoing positions with leave entitlements.
Just 9.5% of casual workers usually work from home, compared to a quarter of other employees:
Not surprisingly, the main reason the owners of businesses work from home is because that is where their work or office is located – chosen due to the lack of overheads or rent that would come with an office situated elsewhere.
For employees, the main reason for working from home is not due to choice. While 20% of those ongoing employees working at home do so because of childcare or other family caring reasons (4.4%) or because of flexible working arrangements (15%), the major reason is due to the amount of work they are required to do.
Fifty eight percent of such employees are working from home to catch up on work – not extra work, not work put off to be done at home, but rather work brought home:
While the data does suggest casual workforce is not becoming more the norm, and thus perhaps to an extent does somewhat allay fears of unions that the casualisation of the workforce is becoming a larger problem, so too does the data highlight that working on the weekends remains the exception.
Over three quarters of all ongoing employees only work Monday to Fridays. While 60% of casual workers only work on weekdays, a mere 2.7% of all employees only work on the weekends.
Even when including those who work on weekdays and weekends, the number is less than a quarter of all employees:
The figures do much to perhaps allay some of the scare campaigns from the union industry that casual labour is becoming a growing issue, but they also support the arguments that penalty rates reflect the fact that most workers, when they head off to work – whether or not they will be also bringing some work home – are doing so Monday to Friday.
Employees working on the weekends may be earning penalty rates, but they very much remain the minority of all workers.
