Demand for new workers rose sharply last month in a vote of confidence in the economic recovery from the business community.

While this won’t stop the jobless rate rising further in the near term, the recent strength of job advertising does suggest the peak will probably be shy of the 6.75 per cent predicted by the government, economists say.

However, the construction sector – a major employer – remains fragile and won’t be helped by recent interest rate rises.

The ANZ job advertisement series – a key pointer to future employment growth – rose 5.2 per cent in November compared to the previous month, and now stands 12.3 per cent higher than the low recorded in July.

ANZ acting chief economist Warren Hogan said the improvement in job advertising would eventually translate into higher employment growth.

“The recent strength in job advertising is consistent with the positive trends seen in many other indicators across the Australian economy,” Mr Hogan said releasing the report on Monday.

“Taken together, these… imply that Australia’s recovery from the recent downturn is gathering pace.”

Newspaper job ads surged 8.3 per cent in November while internet job ads were up five per cent.

Official labour force data is November are due to be published on Thursday.

Economists expect the data to show a modest rise in employment, but not by enough to stop the unemployment rate ticking up to 5.9 per cent, which would be the highest level in over six years.

The jobless rate has been ranging between 5.5 per cent and 5.8 per cent since March of this year.

Still, National Australia Bank senior economist David de Garis said the jobs ads data was consistent with the economic growth momentum that had been seen during the September quarter carrying over to the final three months of this year.

“With employers looking to increase payroll numbers, that’s a big vote of confidence in the outlook for business into the first half of next year,” Mr de Garis said.

However, other data released on Monday showed the construction industry remains fragile, highlighted by a drop in new orders and a fall in employment.

The Australian Industry Group (Ai Group)-Housing Industry Association (HIA) performance of construction index was down 3.3 points at 47.6 in November.

This was below the critical 50 point level that separates expansion from contraction, although well above the lows seen earlier this year.

“The second straight month of falling new orders across the construction industry suggest the current soft market conditions are likely to persist, at least into the early part of next year,” Ai Group director of public policy Peter Burn said releasing the data.

While he was encouraged that the housing sector had continued to grow, the rate of improvement appeared to have slowed over the past two months due to a weakening in first home buyer activity.

“Recent interest rate rises are likely to further dampen growth over coming months,” he said.

HIA senior economist Ben Phillips said the new homes and apartments market was simply “treading water” while Australia’s population was growing at record levels.

“A much needed new homes recovery is being muted by higher interest rates and the removal of the first home buyers grant boost,” he said.

Want to see where these job ads are? Check out www.AussieEmployment.com.au