1
00:00:00,080 --> 00:00:02,880
Speaker 1: Unemployment up to a ten year high five point four percent,

2
00:00:02,960 --> 00:00:06,520
Speaker 1: up from five point three percent. Under usualization also climbing,

3
00:00:06,519 --> 00:00:09,080
Speaker 1: now sitting at a five year high thirteen percent. Alan

4
00:00:09,200 --> 00:00:12,760
Speaker 1: McDonald is with the head of Advocacy, Finance and Strategy

5
00:00:12,760 --> 00:00:16,240
Speaker 1: at the AMA joining US this morning. Ellen, Good morning.

6
00:00:16,680 --> 00:00:19,200
Speaker 1: What are your members seeing to you know, are they hiring?

7
00:00:19,280 --> 00:00:21,560
Speaker 1: Are they sort of holding? What's going on?

8
00:00:23,160 --> 00:00:26,240
Speaker 2: Probably holding, I think is the answer at the moment, Ryan,

9
00:00:26,760 --> 00:00:29,159
Speaker 2: everybody wants everything to get better, and some of the

10
00:00:29,160 --> 00:00:32,280
Speaker 2: indicators are there, but I think they want to see

11
00:00:32,320 --> 00:00:36,920
Speaker 2: a few months or quarters strung together before they follow

12
00:00:37,000 --> 00:00:39,520
Speaker 2: through on some of those intentions to invest into hire.

13
00:00:39,720 --> 00:00:41,840
Speaker 1: This is hard because it's checking and egg stuff. People

14
00:00:41,840 --> 00:00:44,320
Speaker 1: don't want to spend until they know the unemployment rates

15
00:00:44,360 --> 00:00:46,640
Speaker 1: coming down, but businesses don't want to hire until they

16
00:00:46,680 --> 00:00:47,760
Speaker 1: know people are going to spend.

17
00:00:49,040 --> 00:00:51,760
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's a bit of background to those numbers because

18
00:00:52,440 --> 00:00:54,800
Speaker 2: more people are looking, so that counts. But also you

19
00:00:54,840 --> 00:00:56,840
Speaker 2: get a little bump towards the end of the year

20
00:00:57,120 --> 00:01:00,320
Speaker 2: as people leave school and universities and things like that too.

21
00:01:01,400 --> 00:01:05,440
Speaker 2: But some of the underlying more positive stuff says that

22
00:01:05,480 --> 00:01:08,319
Speaker 2: the hiring intentions are there in both the sort of

23
00:01:08,520 --> 00:01:12,280
Speaker 2: performance of manufacturing and Performance of Services index and their

24
00:01:12,360 --> 00:01:14,200
Speaker 2: long run ones. So we pay a lot of attention

25
00:01:14,280 --> 00:01:18,080
Speaker 2: to those, but I think you know that the recovery

26
00:01:18,080 --> 00:01:21,200
Speaker 2: has been coming. The recovery has been coming. Could we

27
00:01:21,280 --> 00:01:24,040
Speaker 2: wait and see some really solid evidence before we follow

28
00:01:24,080 --> 00:01:26,199
Speaker 2: through on some of those intentions?

29
00:01:26,400 --> 00:01:28,080
Speaker 1: Do you think one of the big I was listening

30
00:01:28,080 --> 00:01:30,520
Speaker 1: to an economist yesterday, one of the big problems is

31
00:01:30,560 --> 00:01:32,720
Speaker 1: that we had a sort of a false dawn, false

32
00:01:32,760 --> 00:01:35,880
Speaker 1: start last year. And you know, if this was if

33
00:01:35,880 --> 00:01:37,880
Speaker 1: we'd come straight out of a recession and this was

34
00:01:37,920 --> 00:01:40,440
Speaker 1: the start of it, then perhaps we would be more confident.

35
00:01:40,440 --> 00:01:42,840
Speaker 1: But because we got burnt last time, we're a bit

36
00:01:42,920 --> 00:01:43,399
Speaker 1: gun show.

37
00:01:44,319 --> 00:01:45,800
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think there's a fair bit of that, and

38
00:01:46,280 --> 00:01:48,720
Speaker 2: even going back beyond last year, but I think if

39
00:01:48,760 --> 00:01:50,240
Speaker 2: you remember at the start of last year, it was

40
00:01:50,280 --> 00:01:52,520
Speaker 2: going to be thrive in twenty five and it became

41
00:01:52,600 --> 00:01:54,720
Speaker 2: survived in twenty five and the reality is a lot

42
00:01:54,760 --> 00:01:58,000
Speaker 2: of businesses died in twenty five. So yeah, that's what's

43
00:01:58,080 --> 00:01:59,040
Speaker 2: driving some of that caution.

44
00:01:59,120 --> 00:02:02,360
Speaker 1: I think, is there anything that you, as the UMA

45
00:02:02,560 --> 00:02:06,440
Speaker 1: want done now tomorrow that would help get us out

46
00:02:06,480 --> 00:02:06,720
Speaker 1: of it?

47
00:02:08,680 --> 00:02:10,600
Speaker 2: I don't think there's any sort of magic wave you

48
00:02:10,680 --> 00:02:13,160
Speaker 2: want in a way we go kind of approach. I

49
00:02:13,240 --> 00:02:15,880
Speaker 2: think a lot of the stuff we're seeing from some

50
00:02:15,919 --> 00:02:18,840
Speaker 2: of the policy things, they're getting things out of the way,

51
00:02:19,360 --> 00:02:23,680
Speaker 2: They take time, and so when you get the cumulative

52
00:02:23,680 --> 00:02:26,359
Speaker 2: effect of all of those things coming through, then it's

53
00:02:26,400 --> 00:02:27,960
Speaker 2: not going to be a hockey stick, but I think

54
00:02:28,000 --> 00:02:31,639
Speaker 2: we'll start to see that slide up into recovery.

55
00:02:31,639 --> 00:02:33,400
Speaker 1: If you like, we've just got to do the hard

56
00:02:33,480 --> 00:02:35,239
Speaker 1: yards and tough it out. Alan, appreciate you.

57
00:02:35,280 --> 00:02:36,040
Speaker 2: That's a bit of a grind.

58
00:02:36,120 --> 00:02:38,919
Speaker 1: Appreciate your time as always, Ellen, Alan McDonald's EMA head

59
00:02:38,919 --> 00:02:40,480
Speaker 1: of Edivacy, Finance and Strategy.

60
00:02:41,440 --> 00:02:44,440
Speaker 2: For more from Early Edition with Ryan Bridge, Listen live

61
00:02:44,560 --> 00:02:47,560
Speaker 2: to news talks there'd be from five am weekdays, or

62
00:02:47,639 --> 00:02:49,519
Speaker 2: follow the podcast on iHeartRadio