Last Wednesday, I was pleased to note that the Chinese ban on Australian thermal coal appears to have had little impact so far (check out Pick up in thermal coal prices over last month). This is good news especially for Central Queensland where coal mining is a very important contributor to the regional economy. For instance, it accounts for over half the jobs in the Isaac Local Government Area which hosts over two dozen coal mines (see map below, based on ABS 2016 Census data accessed via Queensland Treasury’s very useful Queensland Regional Database).

It turns out there are up to a few thousand coal mining jobs in Brisbane LGA (see chart below). These must be jobs in the corporate offices of coal miners, given the Census data I’m using are on a place-of-work basis. These figures do not include jobs indirectly supported by coal mining. For estimates of jobs both directly and indirectly supported by the resources sector in Queensland, check out the QRC’s economic contribution estimates, but do note the limitations of these estimates (e.g. see the Australia Institute’s recent commentary).

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