Desk top audit of micro-business in Australia: data

This dataset is an output of a desk audit by Monash University Researcher, Tui McKeown, working with Ken Phillips, executive director of Independent Contractors Australia (ICA), which funded the project. Self-employed people make up 20% of the workforce and are internally recognised as a powerful entrepreneurial and consumer force. However, what is “known” about them is mostly based on assumptions rather than facts. The aims of the project were twofold. The first was to clearly identify and summarise the key features of three of the largest databases and research resources available within Australia for profiling this complex sector. The second is to see what synthesis can be achieved between these three sources as resources and so develop a deeper understanding of this sector. Source data included the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) 2008 Forms of Employment Survey and the 2009 Australian Labour Market report; four reports by the Australian Taxation Office (ATO) into the micro business sector; and from Roy Morgan Research, a 2009 report into the self employed in Australia and the Roy Morgan Research Asteroid database which collected information between January 1999 and December 2008. All data is published in the full report (A desk audit into the data and research on micro-business profiling in Australia) that is available on the ICA website. It provides grounded and accurate information for policy frameworks and will assist those who need to communicate with self-employed people, as well as future PhD students and researchers.