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Australia's Unemployment Rate Rises to 4.5% in April

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Australia's seasonally adjusted unemployment rate rose to 4.5% in April, up from 4.3% in March, data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics showed Thursday.

The consensus forecast was for 4.3%, according to Trading Economics.

The total number of employed people decreased by 18,600, bringing the total to 14.7 million.

"Compared to what we usually see in April, more people remained unemployed this month," said Sean Crick, the bureau's head of labor statistics.

The participation rate edged down 0.1 percentage points to nearly 67% compared with the previous month. The underemployment rate, which refers to the share of workers who want and are available to work additional hours, fell to 5.8% in April from 5.9% in March.

The employment-to-population ratio edged down 0.2 percentage points to nearly 63.7%, the report said. Monthly hours worked across all jobs increased by 16 million hours to 2.04 billion hours in April.

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