We categorise new entrants based on what they were doing in the year leading up to starting work. Career changers, who are new entrants with at least one year's full time work experience, make up almost half of all new entrants across the sectors we follow.
Methodology
New entrants are categorised into the following groups based on any education enrolments in the year leading up to starting work, or work experience in the past five years. They are categorised in a ranked hierarchy of:
- Secondary school leaver (enrolled within one year of starting work)
- Tertiary graduate (enrolled within one year of starting work)
- Career changer (at least one year of work experience within any other sector)
- Immigrant (first arrived in New Zealand within one year)
- Beneficiary (history of beneficiary income)
- Returning Kiwi (return date to New Zealand within one year)
- Others and unknowns
Such that a new entrant recently enrolled in tertiary education with more than one year of work experience is classified as a tertiary graduate as opposed to a career changer.
Access to the anonymised data used in this study was provided by Statistics New Zealand in accordance with security and confidentiality provisions of the Statistics Act 1975, and secrecy provisions of the Tax Administration Act 1994. The findings are not Official Statistics. The results in this paper are the work of the authors, not Statistics NZ, and have been confidentialised to protect individuals, households, businesses, and other organisations from identification. Read our full disclaimer here.
