The most recent data shows that the labour market continues to tighten, with all the main indicators showing improvements over the past quarter, and compared to the previous year, for the second consecutive month.
- The number of payrolled employees increased by 0.1% over the past month to 29.6 million (up 3.0% over the year)
- The employment rate increased by 0.4% over the quarter to 75.9% (up 1.1% over the year)
- The unemployment rate decreased by 0.1% over the quarter to 3.8% (down 1.1% over the year)
- The economic inactivity rate decreased by 0.4% over the quarter to 21.1% (down 0.3% over the year)
- Redundancies fell by 23,000 over the quarter to 51,000 (52,000 fewer than a year ago)
- Vacancies increased by 0.5% over the quarter to reach 1,204,000 (up 49.7% over the year)
- In the Electricity & Gas industries, the number of vacancies increased by 16% during the quarter (up 1.8% over the year) to around 6,000
- In the Water supply, sewerage, waste & remediation activities industries, the number of vacancies increased by 6% during the quarter (up 58.9% over the year) to around 9,000
- Total hours worked increased by 6.5 million hours over the quarter to 1.04 billion hours (up 58.4 million hours over the year)
- Earnings growth in average total pay (including bonuses) was up 6.2% and regular pay (excluding bonuses) was up 4.3%
- In real terms (adjusted for inflation), growth in total pay was down 0.9% on the quarter, with regular pay falling by 2.8% (a record fall for regular pay)
The next update will be on 16 August 2022.
For further information about the labour market, migration or regional labour market indications, please email Rob Murphy, our in-house strategic workforce planning consultant.