Are Australian wages keeping up? Spoiler: it depends where you live.
WPI and CPI both rebased to 100. When the red line runs above the green, inflation is eating your wages. Hover for quarterly detail.
WPI growth vs national CPI (N/A) by state. Green = wages outpacing inflation. Red = going backwards.
Wage growth by industry — national, latest quarter. Reference line: CPI N/A.
Editorial commentary driven by real ABS numbers. No spin.
Wages grew 2.6% nationally, but inflation still ran at 3.8%. That's a real wage cut of 0.60 percentage points. Your pay packet has more digits on it than last year — but buys less. The ABS calls it nominal growth. Everyone else calls it going backwards.
If you work in Health Care and Social Assistance, you're having a better time than most. Wages grew 4.4% in the latest quarter — outpacing national inflation. Skills shortages and strong demand are doing the heavy lifting. If your industry isn't on this list, that's information too.
New South Wales is leading on real wages — WPI growth of +3.66% while national CPI runs at N/A. At the other end, Australian Capital Territory is feeling the most pain with wages growing just +3.69%. The same inflation rate hits every postcode, but not every postcode gets the same pay rise.