Employment and industry concentration risk

INDP is coded to ANZSIC for employed people aged 15 and over, for the main job in the week before Census night, and is usually tabled by place of usual residence. POWP codes the workplace address to a destination zone. The ABS notes that POWP refers to last week, while usual residence and method of travel refer to Census day, so a few records will look odd.

If you need “what do people who live here do?”, use INDP by usual residence. If you need “what work is located here?”, use POWP. Do not add the two percentages.

QuickStats SAL20361, employed usual residents, top INDP responses: Higher Education 901 (5.7 per cent) against Victoria 1.5 per cent; Hospitals (except psychiatric) 845 (5.3 per cent); Cafes and Restaurants 665 (4.2 per cent); Computer System Design 506 (3.2 per cent); State Government Administration 473 (3.0 per cent). Occupation: Professionals 44.1 per cent against Victoria 25.0 per cent.

That is a diversified resident mix with a higher-education and hospital tilt, not a single-plant town. It does not say those jobs are in Brunswick. Many will sit in inner Melbourne. It does not say a Brunswick house price will fall if a campus intake changes. It says the resident income base is spread, with a visible education and health share to watch.

A mine, a base, a plant or a single campus that employs a large share of local usual residents, or of local POWP jobs, is concentration. The test is the share and the alternatives, not the presence of a large name. Confirm the employer still operates. A Census table from 2021 cannot see a later closure. QuickStats only prints top responses, so a plant that is fifth on the list can still dominate a smaller town’s remainder. Open a Community Profile or TableBuilder if you need the full ANZSIC stack. This page does not convert a share into a price path.

Suburb profiles do not currently hold a labelled industry-of-employment breakdown. There is no Districts-derived concentration percentage to quote. Use the ABS tables. If a later product field is added, it must name INDP versus POWP, the geography and the Census night. Until then the field is not loaded.

• Reading residents’ INDP as jobs on the suburb’s streets.
• Adding INDP and POWP shares.
• Treating a high professional share as a price forecast.
• Ignoring that POWP and usual residence use different reference days.

It does not establish future hiring, tenant quality or that prices will fall if one industry shrinks. Income in the Census is a night. Employer plans are the employer’s.

Read the variable name: INDP or POWP. Read place of usual residence versus place of work versus place of enumeration. Use TableBuilder or a Community Profile if QuickStats only shows top responses. Check the employer on the ground if one name dominates. Labour-force status in the Census is also a different object from the monthly Labour Force Survey; the ABS publishes a comparison note. Do not splice them into one unemployment story for a suburb.