Official employment numbers due on Thursday are expected to show ongoing resilience because it takes time for rate increases to slow demand and lessen the need for workers.

In May the jobless rate tightened again to 3.6 per cent, from 3.7 per cent in April, with 76,000 jobs added to the economy.

Westpac is expecting unemployment to hang on at 3.6 per cent for June, while CBA is anticipating it to inch higher to 3.7 per cent.

Forward-looking indicators point to a weaker jobs market, with vacancies down 10 per cent from their peak in the second quarter.

While coming off their heights, job vacancies are still almost double their pre-COVID levels.

NAB’s latest forecasts have employment growth slipping over the second half of the year as the economy slows, with the jobless rate tipped to hit five per cent by the end of 2024.

This would constitute a “serious rise”, but no higher than before the pandemic.

Signs of softening in the labour market will be welcome by the Reserve Bank, which is hoping to keep wages growing sustainably but not enough to jeopardise the task of bringing inflation back to target.

A forward-looking indicator of wage movements, Seek’s advertised salary index, signalled a slower pace of annual growth.

The index still grew a robust 4.5 per cent in the year to June, but was down from 4.7 per cent in May.

Seek senior economist Matt Cowgill said the slowdown in annual terms reflected a slight cooling in the jobs market.

“This suggests that a spiral between prices and wages is not currently occurring,” he said.