More than a million Australians were looking for a job in 2024-2025, with work flexibility a key factor for many.
New data from the Australian Bureau of Statistics found that 1.2 million people were looking for a paid job in that financial year.
"Almost half of the 1.2 million people who wanted a paid job in 2024-25 were unemployed. The rest were either not actively looking for work or not immediately available for work," ABS head of labour statistics Sean Crick said.
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"Almost 1.1 million of this group were available to start work immediately or within the next four weeks, with a further 130,000 not available to start work within the next four weeks."
The difficulties with finding a suitable job differed in some ways between women and men.
The most important factors for women were being able to work part-time hours, and finding a job that matches skills and experience, with 33 per cent of women stating these factors as very important.
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Almost a third of men (32 per cent) reported that the most important factor to get them to work was finding a job that matches skills and experience, followed by support for training or study to improve skills (24 per cent) and ability to work part-time hours (23 per cent).
Women made up the majority of those people not available for work within four weeks, at 65 per cent.
Almost half (43 per cent) of women who wanted to work but were not available within four weeks reported caring for children as the main reason they were unavailable.
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There were also 800,000 people who worked part time and wanted more hours, with 89 per cent of these people available to start working more hours within four weeks.
Of the 5.1 million parents in the past financial year with children under 15, almost 700,000 didn't have a job, of which 16 per cent were looking.
There were about 700,000 people who had a long-term health condition and wanted a job.
While long-term health conditions were a common reason people were unavailable to start work, not all people with a long-term health condition were unable to work.
Long-term health condition or disability was the main reason for 39 per cent of men who were not available for work.
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