Anthony Macdonald

The Australian Financial Review.

I think you want me to say it's good news, James, but I just can't do it.

No, I agree.

The unemployment rate rising, it's not a good thing, just generally.

The number of people in jobs dropping by 19,000 in a month, that's not a good result.

Does it ease pressure on inflation and inflation problem?

Yeah, sure.

I mean, has it eased expectations of interest rate rises?

Absolutely.

I'm still not saying it's good for the economy.

Good would be if the number of jobs grew, the economy grew, prices didn't spiral out of control.

And that only happens if you have productivity.

That lowers the unit labor cost.

It means that companies can put through wage rises without prices increasing.

That would be good for the economy, but we're not there.

We can't grow at 2%, let alone more than 2%, without inflation being a problem.

And so we are where we are.

So, yeah, this softer reading, I mean, it does ease pressure on the RBA, and it shows that the economy is cooling.

But, I mean, unemployment, for context, it's still 4.5%.

It's still a tight jobs market.