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Kadir Atalay

University of Sydney, Australia

I’m pleased to contribute to World of Labour. I hope our article gives readers a clear picture of how Australia’s labour market has changed and the policy challenges that remain.

World of Labour role

Author

Current position

Professor at University of Sydney, Australia

Research interest

Labour economics

Website

https://profiles.sydney.edu.au/kadir.atalay

Past positions

Associate Professor at University of Sydney, Australia

Qualifications

PhD McMaster University, 2009

Selected publications

  • "The impact of age pension eligibility age on retirement and program dependence: Evidence from an Australian experiment." Review of Economics and Statistics, 2015 (with G. F. Barrett).

  • "The effect of retirement on elderly cognitive functioning." Journal of health economics, 2019 (with G. F. Barrett and A. Staneva).

  • "New evidence on taxes and portfolio choice." Journal of Public Economics, 2010 (with S. Alan, T. F. Crossley, and S. H. Jeon).

  • "House prices, housing wealth and financial well-being." Journal of Urban Economics, 2022 (with R. Edwards).

  • "Quantifying the human impact of Melbourne’s 111-day hard lockdown experiment on the adult population." Nature Human Behaviour 7 (2023): 1652–1666 (with S. Schurer, N. Glozier, E. Vera-Toscano, and M. Wooden).

Article(s)

  • The labour market in Australia, 2000-2024 Updated

    Sustained economic growth led to reduced unemployment and real earnings growth, but prosperity has not been equally shared

    Kadir AtalayGarry Barrett, August 2026
    Since 1991 the Australian economy has experienced sustained growth. Aided by the commodities boom and strong public finances, the Australian economy negotiated the global financial crisis without falling into recession. However, the dislocation associated with the Covid-19 pandemic saw the economy enter recession in 2020, before sharply rebounding. Since 2022, unemployment and real weekly earnings have returned to pre-Covid-19 levels but more recently real wages have slipped due to high inflation. Further recent headwinds include a rise in long-term unemployment, deteriorating youth labour market, and a stagnant gender earnings gap.
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