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☆ UK's Hunt offers incentives, penalties to get more people into work
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-16 | by ( Andy Bruce | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

British Chancellor of the Exchequer Jeremy Hunt during Britain's Conservative Party's annual conference in Manchester, Britain, October 2, 2023. The "Back to Work" plan, billed as a way to help people "stay healthy, get off benefits and move into work", will form part of the Autumn Statement that Hunt will present next Wednesday. Anyone choosing to coast on the hard work of taxpayers will lose their benefits," Hunt said of the "Back to Work" plan. "This sort of language just pushes people away – alienating those who could benefit from support, alienating employers and alienating partners like GPs and voluntary services," Wilson said. Labour said Hunt's plan was "more of the same".

Persons: Jeremy Hunt, Toby Melville, Hunt, Tony Wilson, Wilson, Hunt's, Liz Kendall, Andy Bruce, Susan Fenton Organizations: Britain's Conservative, REUTERS, Institute for Employment Studies, Labour Party, Conservative, IES, Labour, Tories, Confederation, Thomson Locations: Manchester, Britain, British

The BoE is monitoring the labour market closely as it considers whether it needs to resume raising interest rates, having kept them on hold in September after 14 hikes in a row. Under the previous methodology, the unemployment rate had been reported as 4.3% for the three months to July rather than 4.2%. Still, the new data showed more slack in the labour market than the BoE had predicted in August, when it forecast an unemployment rate of 4.1% for the third quarter as a whole. "It is probably only a matter of time before the recent loosening of the labour market feeds through into significantly slower wage growth," Pugh said. The latest ONS estimate showed employment fell by 133,000 in the three months to July, compared with 207,000 in its previous estimate.

Persons: BoE, Thomas Pugh, Pugh, Tony Wilson, Andy Bruce, William Schomberg, Paul Sandle, Bernadette Baum Organizations: Office, National Statistics, Bank of England, Labour Force Survey, RSM, ONS, Financial, Institute for Employment Studies, Thomson

For his manager, Barrie Chapman, the overtime he now gets is a huge boost once unheard of in the hospitality sector. At its "Alcampo Lounge" venue in Brighton, staff can get a free meal per shift, flexible hours, bonuses, and overtime for salaried employees. "There's been a trend in hospitality to work staff hard, to not treat them very well, because there was always another person that would come in," said head chef Chris Lloyd-Rogers. "That's why people leave work, and it's what brings people back," Wilson said. Recruitment website Indeed said its regular survey of job seekers showed that the most highly valued benefits were flexible working and sick pay.

Persons: Josh Hughes, Davies, Barrie Chapman, Jen Eaton, Nick Collins, Eaton, Chapman, Hughes, Spencer, Britain's, Loungers, There's, Chris Lloyd, Rogers, Tony Wilson, Wilson, Sarah Findlater, Fiona Walters, Amit Puntambekar, Puntambekar, James Davey, Kate Holton, David Milliken, David Clarke 私 Organizations: Reuters, Amazon, Tesco, Global, Office, National Statistics, Britain, EU, Institute for Employment Studies, Organisation for Economic Co, IES Locations: BRIGHTON, England, Brighton, Britain, Cambridge, London

☆ UK employment hits record high but the economy is still short 1 million workers
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-13 | by ( Hanna Ziady | ) edition.cnn.com time to read: +4 min

London CNN —The number of people in work in the United Kingdom has climbed above its pre-pandemic level for the first time, reaching a record high. Employment hit a record 33.1 million between February and April, with increases in both the number of employees and self-employed workers, the Office for National Statistics said Tuesday. Employment in the United Kingdom has recovered more slowly than in any other major economy since the pandemic, according to the UK Institute for Employment Studies. This is the fastest rise on record, apart from the period when the figures were distorted by the pandemic, Morgan noted. Food inflation remained above 19% — near a 45-year high — hitting poor households the hardest because they spend more of their available income on food.

Persons: Darren Morgan, Morgan, Liz Truss, Jeremy Hunt, ”, Ashley Webb, Anna Cooban Organizations: London CNN, National Statistics, Employment, UK Institute for Employment Studies, Bank of, “, Capital Economics, Bank, Ill Locations: United Kingdom, Europe, United States

☆ Britain's early retired resist calls to work, despite higher living costs
▼ + stars: | 2023-03-09 | by ( David Milliken | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +8 min

The exodus of older workers has no equivalent in other advanced economies. "The best part of 90% of people who say they are early retired ... say that they will probably or definitely never work again." Based on data from before the pandemic, Britain's Resolution Foundation found the richest fifth of 50-59 year olds were 10 times likelier to retire early than the bottom fifth. Other companies say they value older workers for their experience. "Older workers are the ones that have got the skills - we don't find young people with the skills that we need.

☆ Half a million UK workers drop out of workforce, citing long-term illness
▼ + stars: | 2022-11-10 | by ( Suban Abdulla | ) www.reuters.com time to read: +3 min

The increase in long-term sickness started in 2019, before the pandemic, before rising sharply by 363,000 between early 2020 and the three months to the end of August 2022 to reach 2.5 million, it said. The BoE is concerned that the number of people leaving Britain's workforce will fuel inflationary pressures and the latest labour market data pointed to a record workforce exodus. Long-term sickness was the reason given by 28% of people who were neither working nor looking for work between June and August 2022, up from 25% at the start of the pandemic. However, most people who now cite long-term sickness as their reason for not being in work or looking for a job originally dropped out of the labour market for another reason. A combination of factors including a rise in people taking early retirement, long-term illness and lower migration are depleting Britain's workforce, according to the Institute for Employment Studies (IES) which analysed the data.

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