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UNEMPLOYMENT is set to drop more with the number of job opportunities climbing to record amounts, fuelling speculation of another interest rate rise.

National job vacancies in the 90 days to August rose 2.9 %, seasonally adjusted, in line with the Australian Bureau of Statistics.

Work opportunities rose by 11.9 percent in the year to August.

CommSec stocks economist Martin Arnold said with job openings now at an archive high, the unemployment rate was set to fall below 4 per cent - from its present 4.3 per cent - as business conditions inspired businesses to find more staff.

"The Australian economy is recording stable growth and business problems are essentially as effective as they get," he explained.

The strength of the economy led a frustrated John Howard to say people was failing to provide the government credit for economic management.

"I think there is a view in the neighborhood... perhaps a significant number that, for somehow or yet another, our economic power and our economic stability and growth is occurring naturally, that the economy is on autopilot," the Prime Minister told a forum at Ocean Grove on the Victorian coast yesterday.

He said this was one of many reasons why the federal government was faring so poorly in the public opinion polls: "I think folks are beginning to take the Australian economy for granted."

Seasonally-adjusted work vacancies totalled 172,700 in the 3 months to August.

Mr Arnold said there were fewer than three unemployed people for each and every work, the cheapest level on record.

Company services has been among the best development areas, with 45,200 openings, 28.4 percent higher than a year before.

The number of positions vacant in the communications industry has significantly more than doubled to 2800 in exactly the same time.

There is strong demand for labour in the structure, retail trade and transport industries.

Parts that seem to be less desperate for staff include food, entertainment and personal services.

People sector is continuing to expand, with how many vacant jobs 11.8 percent higher than last year.

In the entire year to August, job vacancies in the boom state of Western Australia were up by 31.8 per cent, unadjusted, used by the ACT, that has been up 31 per cent.

Only Queensland had a drop, with year-on-year opportunities down 3.3 %.

Matthew Johnson, the senior economist at broker ICAP, said the increase in jobs vacancies must offer employment growth in excess of 2 percent.

"This means that unemployment will probably drop lower, and that everyone else from the Reserve Bank down will continue to worry about wage-push inflation," he explained.

Large job vacancies and low unemployment is really a conventional formula for inflation, with a limit to just how many opportunities could be filled.

There's, up to now, been no proof of wage inflation, with the average cost of labour increasing broadly in line with costs in the economy. The following inflation numbers are published on October 24.

UBS chief economist Scott Haslem said the growth in job opportunities would donate to higher inflation in the last months of 2007. He expected the Reserve Bank could raise interest rates in February 2008 to prevent inflation planning above the RBA's 3 % target range.

Nevertheless Mr Arnold said the upsurge in labour supply, coming from migration, wouldn't generate wages demands. free bets