The Productivity Commission’s inquiry report into the ‘Review of the National Competition Policy Reforms’ was released in April 2005. In 2004 the Australian Government asked the Productivity Commission to look at the impact on the economy and the community of NCP and related reforms and...

The Productivity Commission research report, ‘Australia's Health Workforce’, was released on 19 January 2006. The Commission was asked to undertake a research study to examine issues impacting on the health workforce over the next 10 years. The main finding of the commissioned study’s...

The Productivity Commission release its research report into the ‘Economic Impacts of Migration and Population Growth’ in May 2006. According to the Commission’s findings increasing skilled migration would make a positive, but small, overall contribution to Australia’s future per capita...

This paper aims to provide an overview of the changing role of part-time work in Australia and was released on 12 June 2008. The objectives of the paper are to - provide a comparison of part-time work in Australia and overseas, and possible reasons for our relatively high reliance on this form...

Births in Australia are at an historical high - with around 285 000 babies born in 2007. This corresponds to an estimated total fertility rate of 1.93 babies per woman, the highest since the early 1980s. This is not a one-off event as fertility rates have been generally rising for the last 6...

This Productivity Commission Staff Working Paper ‘The Growth of Labour Hire Employment in Australia’ was released in February 2005. This paper is part of an ongoing labour market research program at the Productivity Commission to examine developments in employment relationships and the...

The Productivity commission research paper, ‘The Role of Non-Traditional Work in the Australian Labour Market’ was released on 25 May 2006. There is continuing debate in Australia about the effects of labour market changes on the wellbeing of workers and their families. One such change has...

This research paper examines some of the key trends in Australia’s agriculture sector over the last 20 years or so. While continuing to grow in absolute terms, the size and importance of agriculture has declined relative to the rest of the economy. Within the sector, there have been marked...