GWP 901 Professional Workplace Practice:Australian Labor Market

Figure 2: Source: Australia Bureau of Statistics

Body

a. Australian Labor Market trends 

The major sectors that play an essential role in shaping the labor market in Australia include; Mining and manufacturing, healthcare, education and training, construction, professional among others. The labor market in Australia continues to favor people who have a bachelor’s degree or higher education levels. When it comes to labor analysis based on sectors of the economy, sectors that have been experiencing negative employment rates include; Insurance and mining. However, for healthcare and other industries, there has been increased rates of employment over the last few years. Over the last few years, there have been changes in the number of working hours (Australian Government, 2015).

Initially, people sued to work for 35 hours, but it has been changed to 45 hours on a weekly basis. Recently employers have been offering better employment terms such as increased flexibility and fair treatments. The fulltime working hours for men have improved by 1.9 hours weekly (Bartlett, Butler, Rogan, 2016). This has been observed from 1985 to 2005. The most important trend that has been observed in the Australian labor market is the increased implementation and adoption of technology hence changing the nature of skills required. This is an example of structural unemployment being created. However, the labor force has also evolved where they have to go for further training with an objective of keeping up with significant trends in the labor market.

The union influence in the labor market has left the working population vulnerable to the actions of employers. The Individual agreements signed by labor unions enables negations for working conditions where the employer and the employee have to present during this activity. There are still some controversies behind the Individual employment agreement that are being arranged by the labor unions and employers.

In Australia, the labor conditions have improved between June 2015 and June 2016. The increased rate of employment has been attributed to increasing part-time employment which improved by 3.7%. There was also an increase in full-time employment as it rose by 1.1% According to data released by ABS, the employment to population ratio is affected by the demand for labor and labor supply factors. Over the years, Australia the employment to population has increased by 0.3 % (Bartlett, Butler, Rogan, 2016). The assessment is based on the report released in 2016. Additionally, the trend that has been observed in the labor force participation when it comes to age in the same period increased by 77%. The figure below shows the Labor force participation rate and employment-to-population ratio:

Figure 3: Source: Australia Bureau of Statistics

When it comes to labor force participation comparison between both gender, the existing gap between males and males has reduced by 1.1% (Australian Government ,2015). This has been one of the achievements of the G20 goals that is to be accomplished by the country. However, there has been a slight decrease in labor force participation from the male gender. According to the data released in June 2016, the decrease was estimated to be 0.5% whereas the female labor force participation rate improved by 0.6%. (Australian Government, 2015). The graph below shows the Labor force participation rate of males and females aged 15 to 64 years:

Figure 4: source: Australia Bureau of Statistics

b. Healthcare Industry 

The Healthcare Industry is one of the performing industries with job opportunities rising by 11.1%. Additionally, there has been an increase in the number of new roles being advertised at a rate of 14,000 annually (Australian Government, 2015). The average advertised salary is valued at $87,604. Every state in Australia has experienced an increased growth rate where Victoria has 4.2%, Queensland 2.3%, and New South Wales 2.1%(Australian Government, 2015). There have also been changes in the roles of the professional being that people are more concerned with living a healthy life. With the current labor trends in the healthcare industry, there is a likelihood of many career opportunities that people could exploit. The Australian healthcare industry has become a significant employer over the tears because there has been a rise in regional healthcare (Gray & Nowland, 2017). In this country majority of the jobs being advertised are concentrated in healthcare due to increased opportunities Based on my labor market search, the top contributing roles in the healthcare industry include physiotherapy, occupational therapy, nursing and Aged Care Nursing (Muir & Salignac, 2017). The two sectors in the healthcare industry that would be best for degree qualification in the field of medicine is private health and Aged care Nursing.

With the working population in Australia are looking towards better healthcare delivery. As a result, most people prefer private health as they can apply for private health insurance where they can get attended to base on the payment they give. With a bachelor’s degree in Medicine and Surgery, it will be possible to earn better benefits from the increased population that are working. The public health is not in a position to provide people with the health care that is needed (Irwin, 2017). According to the analysis of the labor trend in Australia, there are over 14, 00 healthcare jobs being advertised annually. A degree in Medicine and Surgery opens many platforms of entering in any sector within the healthcare industry. With the degree and acquired skills, there are numerous occupations that I can be able to apply (Bartlett, Butler, Rogan, 2016). First, my bachelor’s degree can land me an opportunity as a physician and a surgeon. This can be an excellent opportunity. Within the private health, I can also be able to find a job as a consultant. This is where people will be becoming with any health conditions for any consultations as a physician and make any prescriptions.

Age care has been on demand in Australia because the majority of the population are aged. This is always a career path that is challenging and demanding. According to the analysis of trends in the labor market, nurses are in high demand (Ahsan & Rahman, 2017). With the rise in aging population, a career in Nursing will help land in a lucrative job that will be able to change my income and earnings as an employee (Zwar, Dennis, Griffiths, Perkins, May, Hasan & Caplan, 2017). Australia will be forever having an aged population. Therefore, this is a career opportunity that will offer numerous opportunities (Fincher, 2014). When it comes to Age care, there are different people to be cared for such as dementia, older people and offering palliative care services (Wakerman, Humphreys, Wells, Kuipers, Entwistle, & Jones, 2017).

According to my present area of study, I would go for offering palliative services with an objective of improving the quality of life of patients. The increase in the aging population and increase in chronic illnesses which are incurable, the population requiring palliative care has widened and will continue to widen over the years (Atalay & Barrett, 2015). According to the data released in 2015, there was a total increase of population requiring palliative care by 28% from 2011 to 2012. With a degree in Nursing, I will be able to offer palliative care services.

c. Intercultural challenges 

Learning in a foreign country with new people is always challenges experiences. Some of the challenges that international students experience includes; First, international students do struggle for a sense of identity. This is because, there are also faced with a new environment, language, cultures, and beliefs. With this, it becomes difficult to find someone that he/she can associate with and find out be at ease. The loss of sense of identity always makes these international students to develop cultural stress making it difficult for them adapt to studies and interact. Cultural stress often arises from the differences between the culture in the host country and home country. Other factors influencing the level of cultural str3ess include self-esteem and education level/status. With the cultural stress, the degree of social interaction and establishment of relationship will be a challenge to international students. Another challenge is the language barrier (Ang, 2018). Moving to a foreign country with a different language may make it difficult to adapt to the new environment. This may lead to ineffective communication a misunderstanding.

As an illustration, in most cases, students are always taken to countries with French, Germany, Chinese or Japanese as their main language. From these foreign languages, a student may find it difficult concentrating in classes and making friends. International students are also forced to take an additional language class where they can be able to learn the host’s language (Ang, 2018). This is often time-consuming and may delay the academic progress. An international student is always faced with racial discrimination due to the color of their skin, racial background and lack of a sense of identity. Students from the host country may also bully due to the cultural differences. Lastly, international students always faced with a clash of cultures where they have to embrace the culture of the host country and their cultures from home. Adapting to this type of cultural transition may affect the child psychological hence affect academic performances. These challenges may make it hard to find an employment opportunity (Ang, 2018). The student may form a negative perspective when it comes to seeking career opportunities in the host country. Dealing with these challenges will require an orientation before going to the foreign country. The orientation will involve learning about their language and cultures. These strategies will help in a smooth cultural transition.

d.   Recommendation 

According to the analysis of labor trends in Australia, shortly, the market will belong to the highly skilled laborers. This means that to survive in this kind of labor market; a laborer has to stay competitive. This requires that one should increase his/her level of education (Crossland, 2011). As an illustration, with a degree in any field, a higher level or any other relevant degree will be required. Secondly, the acquisition of skills is necessary. Better skills are gained through experience (Frey & Osborne, 2017). This means to survive in future; employees are required to have skills employers are seeking. Based on the labor markets, the following will be relevant job searching strategies; first, one should get noticed by their dream company where you will be applying for jobs that they are offering.

Secondly, as a laborer, it will be prudent to search for the right jobs (Crossland, 2011). This means searching for the jobs will involve narrowing the job search to the areas of expertise and interests. Job search requires strong networking where during your job search you should connect with the people you know at different positions.

Conclusion

The trend in labor markets as observed in Australia has been changing, and it is expected to change in the future. These labor trends have an impact on the decisions people make when seeking for career opportunities. From the data collected, the hospital industry has been considered to be the greatest employer and continues to advertise more than 14,000 annually with a better pay of over $86000 on a monthly basis. With these trends, the Age Care and private health sectors continue to be performing because people require better healthcare services. People should, therefore, make both long term and short-term objects when investing in their careers in the healthcare industry.

References

Ahsan, K., & Rahman, S. (2017). Green public procurement implementation challenges in Australian public healthcare sector. Journal of Cleaner Production, 152, 181-197.

Ang, S. (2018). Intercultural dialogue through design (iDiDe): A model of intercultural collaboration and student engagement. In Student Engagement and Participation: Concepts, Methodologies, Tools, and Applications (pp. 177-202). IGI Global.

Atalay, K., & Barrett, G. F. (2015). The impact of age pension eligibility age on retirement and program dependence: Evidence from an Australian experiment. Review of Economics and Statistics, 97(1), 71-87.

Australian Government (2015). Analysis of Trends in the Australian Labor Market. Retrieved from: https://www.jobs.gov.au/annual-report-2016/analysis-trends-australian-labour-market

Bartlett C., Butler S., Rogan C. (2016). Australia's healthcare system: An opportunity for economic growth. Retrieved from: https://www.strategyand.pwc.com/reports/australias-healthcare-system

Crossland, L. J. (2011). Perceptions of the roles and skills of primary health care professionals: implications for innovative and sustainable rural primary health care delivery (Doctoral dissertation, James Cook University).

Fabbri, A., Grundy, Q., Mintzes, B., Swandari, S., Moynihan, R., Walkom, E., & Bero, L. A. (2017). A cross-sectional analysis of pharmaceutical industry-funded events for health professionals in Australia. BMJ open, 7(6), e016701.

Fincher, R. (2014). Class and gender relations in the local labor market and the local state. In The Power of Geography (RLE Social & Cultural Geography) (pp. 109-133). Routledge.

Frey, C. B., & Osborne, M. A. (2017). The future of employment: how susceptible are jobs to computerization? Technological forecasting and social change, 114, 254-280.

Gray, S., & Nowland, J. (2017). The diversity of expertise on corporate boards in Australia. Accounting & Finance, 57(2), 429-463.

Halcomb, E., & Ashley, C. (2017). Australian primary health care nurses most and least satisfying aspects of work. Journal of clinical nursing, 26(3-4), 535-545.

Irwin, R. (2017). Understanding variation in the clinical quality of primary care: a typology of general practice organisations (Doctoral dissertation, University of Birmingham).

Muir, K., & Salignac, F. (2017). Can market forces stimulate social change?: A case example using the national disability insurance scheme in Australia. Third Sector Review, 23(2), 57.

Wakerman, J., Humphreys, J., Wells, R., Kuipers, P., Entwistle, P., & Jones, J. (2017). A systematic review of primary health care delivery models in rural and remote Australia 1993-2006.

Wong, P. Y., Higgins, D., & Wakefield, R. (2017). Foreign real estate investment, residential tourism and the Australian residential property market. International Journal of Housing Markets and Analysis, 10(5), 586-606.

Zwar, N., Dennis, S., Griffiths, R., Perkins, D., May, J., Hasan, I., ... & Caplan, G. (2017). Optimizing skill-mix in the primary health care workforce for the care of older Australians: A systematic review.