Unemployment figures are above 2.5 million in the UK, but rumour has it that the dreaded R word is soon to be replaced with a better R word: recovery.
The CIPD have recently issued a report called
"Jobs: The Impact Of Recession & Prospects For Recovery" that assesses the overall impact the recession has had on the UK labour market, and also considers what may happen with jobs when the economy begins the recovery.
It makes a number of conclusions, some of which are detailed below:
- The percentage fall in employment during this recession has been less than a third as large as the percentage contraction in the economy. This represents a lower "job distress ratio" than that experienced in the recessions of the 80s and 90s. Had previous UK experience been repeated, it is likely that around 500,000 more jobs would have been lost.
- Compared with previous recessions, the burden of labour market adjustment has been shared more evenly across the workforce in the form of reductions in incomes rather than falling mainly on jobs. A "shared pain recession" of this kind demonstrates that (contrary to common perception), Britain's flexible labour market is good for jobs & social wellbeing.
- In employment terms, our recession's biggest losers have been:
- men,
- full-time employees,
- people at both ends of the age spectrum,
- blue collar and unskilled workers,
- UK-born workers, and
- private sector workers.
- The West Midlands, an area heavily dependent on the health of the manufacturing sector, has emerged as the UK's main regional unemployment black spot.
- From autumn 2009 onward, the rise of unemployment toward a likely peak at above 3million in 2010 will be more of a crawl than a rush. It is possible that policy initiatives such as the Youth Job Guarantee might even succeed in limiting the peak in measured unemployment to below 3million.
