Australia's unemployment rate has fallen to 5.7% with the creation of more than 31,000 new jobs in November.
The news has surprised economists, who were generally expecting significantly fewer jobs to have been created during the month; even the two most optimistic analysts had predicted the creation of only 20,000 jobs.
The consensus forecast had been for the jobless rate to creep higher from 5.8 to 5.9%, on the basis that a rising population wasoutpacing job creation.
Even better news was that full-time jobs made up most of the increase, with the Bureau of Statistics survey showing 30,800 full-time positions created, seasonally adjusted.
