How does the current jobs market appear?

Labour market statistics

1. Unemployment is 1,455,000, and fell by 28,000 from last month’s published figure (quarterly headline down by 75,000) and the unemployment rate is 4.3%, down 0.1 percentage points on last month and down 0.2 percentage points on last quarter.

2. The number of claimant unemployed is 806,300, down 2,800 on last month, and the claimant rate is 2.3%.

3. The number of workless young people (not in employment, full-time education or training) is 954,000, up 1,000 on the quarter, representing 13.4% of the youth population (up 0.1 percentage points).

4. Youth unemployment (including students) is 528,000, down 36,000 on the quarter.

5. There are 1.9 unemployed people per vacancy.

6. The employment rate is 75.3% (up 0.1 percentage points on last month’s published figure and up 0.5 percentage points in the preferred quarterly measure).

 

The labour market figures published on 13 September provide a distinct feeling of deja vu as they show another strong increase in employment combined with falling unemployment and falling economic inactivity amongst people of working age. However, it is also the case that workers are getting poorer with real wages falling for the fifth month in a row.