Fewer people working long hours

The proportion of employed people working 50 hours or more per week dropped to 20 percent in 2013, according to census results released by Statistics New Zealand today. This is down from 23 percent in 2006, and 25 percent in 2001.

Queenstown-Lakes district had the highest proportion of people employed full-time, at 62 percent. Kawerau district had the lowest, at 31 percent. The overall New Zealand figure was 48 percent.

"More people aged 65 years and over are working full-time. Five percent of full-time workers were in this age group in 2013, compared with 3 percent in 2006. For part-time work, the proportion also jumped - to 13 percent in 2013, compared with 9 percent in 2006," Census Customer Focus Manager Gareth Meech said.

Nearly one-quarter of employed people were in the ‘professionals’ occupation group, with a higher proportion of women (57 percent) than men (43 percent).

"Men dominated the construction and mining industries, at 86 percent and 85 percent, respectively. But women dominated in health care and social assistance, at 82 percent, and the education and training industry, at 74 percent," Mr Meech said.

Proportionally, more Mâori and Pacific peoples spent time looking after children from their own households (42 percent and 41 percent, respectively), compared with other ethnic groups participating in this unpaid activity (around 30 percent each).

2013 Census QuickStats about work and unpaid activities includes information about work and labour force status, status in employment, occupation, industry, sector of ownership, hours worked, and unpaid activities.

Other key points from the release include:

Employers were more than twice as likely to be men as women.

Sales workers were most commonly young people (aged 15-24 years).

Voluntary work was highest among people aged 65 years and over.

The data visualisations 2013 Census occupation treemap and 2013 Census industry treemap let you compare changes in proportions of employed people in occupations and industries between the 2013 and 2006 Censuses. You can also download data in CSV format from within the visualisations.