Some 1400 academic positions were advertised in October, better than the 2019 average of 1000 a month

And it was way better than the bottom of the pandemic – 290 positions vacant postings in April 2020.

The finding is from ANU’s PostAC team, which analyses labour markets to identify demand for people with high-level research skills.

The new number confirms a trend the PostAc team reported in August, when they found academic jobs advertisements in June 2021 were at 90 per cent of June ’19, (CMM August 24 2021).

PostAC also identifies a sharp and fast rebound in non-academic research jobs. Advertisements less declined than plummeted from 15 200 a month in 2019 to 6400 in April 2020. However the 2019 average was reached in February 2021 and advertised demand has continued since.

PostAC  was created to help new PhDs job-hunt outside the academy.