AKA: employment, jobs
What this graph shows
- % of working-age adults (18-64) on a Main Benefit at the end of each quarter.
- 2008 Q3 onwards, as that is when the quarterly benefit fact sheets began.
Key notes
- The official unemployment rate remains the lead measure for most politicians, economists, and media, but it contains multiple flaws that result in it undercounting the true levels, so it should NOT be used as the definitive rate of unemployment. See https://thefacts.nz/67000-more-kiwis-on-jobseeker-support-than-officially-unemployed/ for an example of how misaligned the Jobseeker Support numbers are compared to the official unemployment rate. Those flaws include:
- If you’re on a benefit and able to work, but not actively looking, then you don’t meet the criteria to be classified as unemployed. This is contrary to the layman's view.
- Someone actively looking, but not available for the next 4 weeks, is also not considered unemployed.
- "To be counted as 'employed' a person need only be working one or more hours a week", and that can include unpaid work. So, if you work for just 1 hour helping a family business or mowing a friend's lawn, for free, then you are rounded up and considered 100% employed for the week, not 2.5% employed (1/40 hours) and 97.5% unemployed (39/40 hours) for a more accurate representation. There is no weighting, only a binary classification of either 'employed' or 'unemployed'.
- 30 hours is used to determine a full working week, not the standard 40 hours. Again, we believe this should be pro-rated where 30 hours = 75% employed and 25% either unemployed if you're on a benefit and want to work a full 40 hours, or underutilised if you're not on a benefit and don't want to work for 40 hours.
- As of June 2026,12.7% of Kiwi adults (18-64) were claiming a main benefit, while the official unemployment rate was just 5.6%. While some part-time workers can also receive a benefit, a significant number of unemployed Kiwis also don't claim a benefit as they don't qualify. As such, it's hard to believe the true unemployment rate is just 5.6% when i) 12.7% are on main benefits, and ii) there are others who are unemployed and don't get a benefit at all.
- As you can see from this graph, the unemployment rate had always tracked higher than the Jobseeker Support rate from 2008 as we'd expect, until 2018 when the numbers reversed and the number on Jobseeker benefits far exceeded those officially unemployed. This further eroded confidence in the official unemployment rate.
- Multiple people contacted us before the 2023 election saying that some unemployed had been moved across to sickness benefits to hide the true unemployment rate. This might not be true. We will investigate this as resources allow, but it does erode our confidence hearing many stories like this.
- If the unemployment rate has always been done in this same consistent way, then it is a useful relative/comparison metric over time. However, given all of the reasons above, we do not have enough confidence that it shows the true unemployment rate in New Zealand.
- The seasonality spikes around summer are in large part due to students finishing their secondary or tertiary study years who then move onto a main benefit, and sometimes, the unemployment measure.
- External factors can influence these results, and context is important, but governments are ultimately accountable for New Zealand's performance.
- Remember that each Labour-led or National-led government has had coalition partners that share in their successes and failures. A full list of governments for this time range is at the bottom of this page.
Why this KPI?
- As mentioned above, we don't have confidence in the official unemployment rate being a true and accurate measure of the % unemployed.
- As such, we have also used the % of adults on a Main benefit, to better represent how many Kiwis are wanting or needing work and can't find it.
- A fair challenge is that some unemployed can't qualify for a benefit or choose not to take a benefit, but, stronger arguments hold true in the opposite direction (see list above). We believe we can't use the official unemployment rate until those fundamental formula issues are resolved.
- The total number of adults on ANY benefit (not just main benefits) is not published at this stage. We have asked MSD for this data.
Data sources
Full data:
Data not used
Data timing
Related facts
Wishlist
With support, we’ll be able to add multiple KPIs for each issue:
- True unemployment rate
- Updates on many of KPIs listed above.
Governments over the timeframe shown
- 2005 = Labour/Progressive + United, NZ First
- 2008 = National + ACT, United, Māori
2011 = National + ACT, United, Māori
2014 = National + ACT, United, Māori
- 2017 = Labour/NZ First + Green
2020 = Labour + Green
- 2023 = National/ACT/NZ First
/ = Coalition partners
+ = Other formal governing agreements, including confidence and supply, support and cooperation.
Sources:1,2 (see table)
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Data published by Ministry of Social Development
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Analysis and graphics © KPI.nz 2026. Please share widely! You're welcome to reproduce our work with attribution and a link to the original post.
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