Due to long-term illnesses, more and more people are not working or not even looking for work, i.e. economically inactive. However, this is already a major risk in terms of economic growth. He writes euronews.
UK unemployment figures for the three months to April 2024 were published on Tuesday morning, showing an unemployment rate of 4.4 per cent, according to the Office for National Statistics. This exceeded the expected value compared to the previous period and analysts' expectations (4.3 percent).
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This number is the highest since September 2021. The number of unemployed people in the United Kingdom rose to 1.51 million, which is why we have to talk about an increase of 24 thousand.
The number of people who have been unemployed for more than 6 months has also increased, as has the number of people who have been unemployed for more than a year. Also during this period The number of economically inactive people has already reached 9.43 million. This includes people who are not currently working but are not looking for a new job either.
This also includes people who have become unemployed due to a long-term illness. Their numbers rose from 55,000 to 2.83 million in the three months to April. Set another record. This group includes, for example, those suffering from the long-term effects of Covid-19.
This Parliament has seen the largest increase in economic inactivity and the largest decline in the size of the workforce since similar records began being kept in 1971.
Tony Wilson, Director of the Institute for Employment Studies, said:
Wilson said reforming employment support should be a top priority for the next parliament so more people can get the help they need to get back into work.
The number of workers currently stands at 33 million, which is 29,000 people more than it was in the period mentioned above. The number of full-time workers has generally declined.
The economic inactivity rate also rose to 22.3 percent, an increase of 0.2 percent.
Despite all this, the pay increase has been strong. In the UK, the regular pay rise calculated without bonuses increased by 6 percent year-on-year, to £640 (about 300,000 HUF) per week during this period. The business and financial sectors achieved the greatest growth, along with the services and manufacturing sectors.
Unemployment rates have never been this low in the eurozone
The numbers were as expected.
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