One of the latest research reports from Jobs and Skills Australia (JSA) is the Vacancy Report: August 2025 which looks at online job advertisements.
JSA starts the report by observing that:
“This month’s results show the resumption of the downward trend in online job advertisements observed over much of the last 3 years. Despite this, advertisement numbers remain at elevated levels, with around 20% more advertisements in the labour market presently than compared with the monthly average for 2019.”
In the 12 months to August 2025, online job advertisements decreased by 12.2% (or 28,000), and the strongest decreases in recruitment activity were recorded New South Wales (down by 7.6% or 4,900 job advertisements) followed by the Northern Territory (down by 6.4% or 190) and the Australian Capital Territory (down by 5.1% or 240).
In a deep dive on what the data means for entry level positions, JSA notes that “labour market indicators suggest younger workers have experienced relatively favourable conditions during the robust recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic. However, this positive outlook is tempered by a noticeable decline in demand for workers in some high-volume entry-level occupations.”
They go on to note that demand in a number of key entry-level occupations, which employ large numbers of younger Australians, has eased.
Specifically, the data shows that online job advertisements for Cafe Workers, Waiters, Sales Assistants (General), and Kitchenhands have declined since the recruitment peak in late 2022, between -40 to -80%.
They also go on to discuss their recent report on the impact of Generative AI on the Australian labour market and note that emerging technologies (including GenAI) “are expected to have a disproportionate effect on entry-level occupations, in that these technologies will be most proficient in completing standardised and repetitive tasks,” and there are “visible examples of AI-supported automation displacing younger workers, such as a 20.6% decline in Checkout Operator and Office Cashier employment over the past 5 years”.
However the good news is that JSA’s analysis indicates that entry-level roles are more likely to “evolve with AI augmentation, demanding new capabilities such as domain expertise and critical thinking, with industry-specific variation expected as adoption accelerates.”
So the VET sector will need to be aware of the changes happening in entry level occupations and the changing skills needed by employers – but there’s a reasonably positive outlook for young people going into entry-level roles even in this period of change in the Australian labour market.
