A colleague of mine thinks it says something about the quality of economic journalism in this country that Qantas shedding 500 jobs overshadowed the excellent ABS employment data released today, as shown by this screen shot from the Age website earlier today:

The Bligh Government is now only around 5,000 jobs short of its 100,000 new jobs target since the 2009 election. So it’s possible the Government will be able to claim it’s reached the target in the middle of the election campaign, which will boost morale even though it probably won’t influence the ultimate election outcome.

Information on today’s labour market numbers are available in OESR’s information brief.