BNZ head of research Stephen Toplis said, in some ways, it was the best of both worlds for New Zealand.
"The expansion that is occurring is failing to generate any obvious signs of impending inflation."
Statistics New Zealand released both the index and survey for the September quarter yesterday, but the markets always note the measures are volatile.
A fuller picture of the labour market will be released tomorrow through the household labour force survey.
Mr Toplis said the employment survey showed that filled jobs in the economy rose a "creditable" 0.7% in the quarter. On an annual basis, the increase was 0.6%, the first increase in a year.
"This is a remarkable achievement given that the Christchurch earthquake resulted in a 3.7% annual drop in jobs for the Canterbury region."
The figures implied there would be a small fall in the unemployment rate tomorrow, he said.
Given the turmoil faced in the past 12 months to 18 months, it was of merit that the unemployment rate was not skyrocketing, let alone falling, Mr Toplis said.
However, the state of the labour market could well prove to be a double-edged sword in the medium term.
The economy was expected to pick up pace through next year.
That would result in a sharp drop in the unemployment rate and imply future upward pressure on wage rates and generalised inflation while limiting the economy's potential to expand, he said.
"But that would very much seem a problem for the future. Right here and now, there is little in the data to suggest there is now meaningful rising pressure on wages."
The labour cost index - private sector total salary and wage rates - rose 0.5% for the quarter to be up 2% for the year. That was in line with the sort of wage inflation considered consistent with the Reserve Bank getting headline inflation back to the midpoint of its 1% to 3% range.
The labour cost index gave a much clearer view of inflationary pressures the economy faced, but the employment survey provided more insight on how workers were faring.
The data continued to show that the "average punter" should be holding their own, Mr Toplis said.
The annual increase in private sector average hourly earnings was 3.2%, the largest increase since September 2009.
When the small rise in hours worked in the period was factored in, total wage growth rose to 4.1%.
Mr Toplis said some commentators had concluded that was a parlous state of affairs given that annual inflation was running at 4.6%, seemingly eroding all the gains from wage growth.
"At face value that may be the case. But one must not forget there were also substantial tax cuts through this period, which have alone lifted average take home pay by between 2.3% and 6.4%."
That would have more than offset the negative impact on spending power from the rise in consumer price index inflation, he said.
Real disposable incomes would be increasing, which explained why retail sales volumes through the September quarter were estimated to be up 1.5% on a year ago, despite the household savings ratio also rising.
The New Zealand data yet again placed the country in a "very comfortable" position by international comparison, Mr Toplis said.
