UK Unemployment falls below 7%

The number of people out of work in the UK has fallen by 77,000 to a five-year low of 2.24m in the three months to February, official figures indicate.

The unemployment rate now stands at 6.9% of the adult working population according to the latest figures from the Office for National Statistics.

This means that the unemployment rate has fallen below the threshold at which the Bank of England said last August it would consider raising interest rates under its policy of forward guidance. However, this does not necessarily men there sill be an increase this month from the current historic low rate of 0.5%.

This news comes as it has also been reported that Average earnings in the three months to February grew 1.7% compared with a year earlier, while CPI inflation was recorded to have fallen to 1.6% in March. It is the first time since the spring of 2010 that the increase in average wages has exceeded the Consumer Price Index (CPI) measure of inflation.

It is also the first time since the recession that unemployment has fallen below 7%.

David Kern, chief economist at the British Chambers of Commerce, told the BBC that the latest ONS figures demonstrated the resilience and flexibility of the UK labour market.

But he added: "Concerns do persist, however. The youth unemployment rate is still much too high at 19.1% and, while long-term unemployment is falling, more than 800,000 people have been unemployed for more than a year.

"These concerns aside, it is clear that the recovery is on the right track. To consolidate this, it is important that we see measures to increase productivity and firmer action on youth and long-term unemployment.

"Improved access to finance, incentives to recruit apprentices, and support for export and investment will go some way to achieving this."

Comments

Jim said…
Seems good that unempoyment is falling. Though I must add i do tend to take unemployment figures with a pinch of salt. Lots of people are not "unemployed" but they are not emplyed by others or themselves either. People on training courses and things, basically a large number of people for several different reasons dont or cant work, but are not officially unemployed.

Much like the suicide attempt rate in guantanimo bay, basically the rate was way to high, so the DoD re defined what is a suicide attempt, and what is other "self harm" and instantly the suicide attempt rate plummeted.

Another classic example i keep banging on about is of course inflation, inflation was getting silly, so TPTB simply redefined inflation and lo and behold the inflation rate plummeted as well. Brilliant.
1:28 pm
Chris Whiteside said…
There is some justification for your being sceptical - in the proper sense of that word - about government statistics since administrations of every political colour changed the figures to get what they wanted in the past.

A change is only meaningful when comparing figures compiled on a consistent basis and issued or verified by an independent body.

Both the reduction in unemployment and that in inflation which I quoted for last month are sourced from the "Office for National Statistics" which is a lot more independent than the arrangements for measuring and publicising statistics used to be, and both represent improvements on a "like for like basis." You can make an argument about what the true level is, but the figures on any given basis really are improving.

Car tax did indeed go up by slightly more than inflation for both the two years you mention.
1:40 pm
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Nick Herbert on his visit to flood hit areas of Cumbria

Please note that the post below was published more than ten year ago on 21st November 2009 Nick Herbert MP, shadow cabinet member for the Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs, was in Cumbria this morning to see the areas affected by the flooding. He writes on Conservative Home about his visit. Here is an extract. I’ve been in Cumbria today to see the areas affected by the floods. I arrived early in Keswick where I met officials from the Environment Agency. Although the river levels had fallen considerably and homes were no longer flooded, the damage to homes had been done. And the water which had got into houses wasn’t just from the river – it was foul water which had risen from the drains. I talked to fire crews who were pumping flood water back into the river, and discovered that they were from Tyne & Wear and Lancashire. They had been called in at an hours’ notice and had been working on the scene ever since, staying at a local hotel. You cannot fail to be impressed by the
Read more

Quotes of the day 19th August 2020

Image
"Wise men profit more from fools than fools from wise men; for the wise men shun the mistakes of fools, but fools do not imitate the successes of the wise."  ( Cato the Elder , who lived 234 BC - 149 BC, quoted in "Lives" by Plutarch.) There is a similar saying by Germany's Iron Chancellor, Otto von Bismarck: Benjamin Franklin is supposed to have put the same saying in a more humorous form: "Wise men profit by the mistakes of others, while fools will not learn even from their own blunders." See also this thread on the "Quote Investigator" website . Let us all be wise and learn from the events of the last few days.
Read more

Quote of the day 24th July 2020

Image
I was moved to put the passage below forward as a quote today when I saw a horrible post on twitter from someone writing that it was "excellent" that someone who took a different view from her about Brexit had died. I won't write which way round it was so that all the Remain supporters can assume the post was from a Brexit fanatic welcoming the death of a remainer and all the Leavers can assume it was a Remainiac welcoming one less Brexiteer. There's been plenty of nasty stuff on both sides but if you catch anyone of your own viewpoint  posting something like that who might listen to you, please do call them out on it - and point out that they're giving everyone on your side of the argument a bad name. Anyway, here's the quote from John Donne.
Read more