A quarter of adults out of work

MRSTITTLEMOUSE

matbe wrote: »

How many have never had a job and as long as the benefit cheque drops thru the door every fortnight will continue to not bother ?

How do they calculate the amount of people like me though.
I don't claim benefits,never have but have never ever had a job either.
Government figures usually need some tweaking as they are just too approximate to be accurate.

Really2

vivatifosi wrote: »

However in reality, most people haven't paid nearly enough into their pension funds and the thought of retiring early is the preserve of a very lucky few.

I think any one over 60 that has paid enough stamp are entitled to pension credit if they are out of work. Thus early state retirement.
http://www.direct.gov.uk/en/MoneyTaxAndBenefits/BenefitsTaxCreditsAndOtherSupport/On_a_low_income/DG_10018692

I currently know 2 under 65's who have now retired during the recession I presume they both in the "inactive" figures.

ninky_2

MRSTITTLEMOUSE wrote: »

How do they calculate the amount of people like me though.
I don't claim benefits,never have but have never ever had a job either.
Government figures usually need some tweaking as they are just too approximate to be accurate.

out of interest how do you support yourself financially? are you "independently wealthy"?:D

lostinrates

I'm one of hose who have stopped looking. I wanted, a long time a go, a job. Nothing fancy, shop work..but needed set hours and no weekends. Initially of course I had no where near the skills of graduate, follwing the head-break, but even four years ago I could have managed 4-5 hours 4 days a week or something (four days to leave me a day for medical appts and/or rest, 4-5 hours would have been hard at first, but I would have coped, would have built stamina). There was so little it seemed ridiculous. No chance of a graduate job. Have done patchy little fill in jobs for friends ccasionally, but feel a bit like a dog being thrown a biscuit. Then started to feel, with crash, that with a reliable and not small income in to our household anyway it would be selfish for me to take a job that would suit someone who didn't have that.

On stats I just show as ''housewife'' I guess.

carolt

Apply again, lir - if you want to.

On the evidence of your posts on here, you've clearly got your head 'back' to the extent where you could handle any job I can think of.

Or write that book I keep asking for?

I find your animally tales v entertaining - lol kind of funny - so why not have a go?

As an animal aside - we appear to have been adopted by our next-door neighbour's cats. I'm not sure if they're being maltreated or not fed or something (they seem like v nice neighbours so it seems unlikely...) but basically, the cats spend all their time mewing piteously outside our doors to be let in, sneak in the second we open the door when we get home, and have even managed to evade us a couple of times when we went out, leaving us to come back home from work/school to find a rather bored cat asleep on the sofa!

Possibly they just love the range of titbits my 3 year-old leaves tastefully arranged under his high-chair; possibly they find it impossible to forget the time DD2 tried to 'get rid of them' by feeding them fishfingers...

Hmmm.

Anyway. We now have free pets. We don't pay to feed them (except fishfingers), don't pay for insurance etc - but we have 2 full-time cats.

MRSTITTLEMOUSE

ninky wrote: »

out of interest how do you support yourself financially? are you "independently wealthy"?:D

I married at 16 straight from school and have a husband who never wanted me to work.
I know that maybe an old fashioned idea now but it's worked for us.
I do a lot of volunteer work to fill my time in now my children are grown so I'm not idle either.

vivatifosi

Morning all,

lir, I found your story sad, but not unfortunately unusual although your case is clearly specific to you.

All of the news stories only give us a bit of the picture, but trying to put it all together we have:

* Relatively high unemployment (compared to historic in this country) due to recession.
* Higher levels of underemployment as those re-entering the workplace are not able to find full time work.
* People giving up on job market altogether and taking time out.
* People who are able to retire early (per Really's post)
* More students trying to get into uni or further education at a time that funding is being cut.
* A public sector that lags the private sector in terms of job cuts but in which jobs will have to be cut given statements being made by local councils, etc.

We tend to focus here on the unemployment rate and those who have been moved to other benefits to massage the numbers as they are a direct cost to the state, but surely if the activity rate in society is dropping, then the burden of paying back the debt mountain falls to a smaller number of economically active people achieving their full potential and that's an even bigger problem.

Blacklight

vivatifosi wrote: »

......The total number of economically inactive hit 8.16 million, the highest since the ONS started recording this measure in 1971.

Why should every adult of working age work? What a ridiculous measure of anything...

Some people don't want to work because they have to stay at home and look after children.
Some people are just wealthy enough not to work.
Some people want to live the good life and feed their chickens.
Some people are happily retired before retirement age.

Actually about 8 million people I'd wager.

Of course the damn figure has gone up since 1971, there's now 7 billion people in the world!

vivatifosi

Blacklight wrote: »

Why should every adult of working age work? What a ridiculous measure of anything...

You're totally missing the point. The number of economically inactive has risen. Of course there has always been economic inactivity, however it is the degree of economic inactivity and the reasons that have changed. This has nothing to do with the world's population rising to 7bn as the numbers are specific to the UK. If the data are that uninteresting why would the ONS have reported on it so consistently?

Blacklight

vivatifosi wrote: »

You're totally missing the point. The number of economically inactive has risen. Of course there has always been economic inactivity, however it is the degree of economic inactivity and the reasons that have changed. This has nothing to do with the world's population rising to 7bn as the numbers are specific to the UK. If the data are that uninteresting why would the ONS have reported on it so consistently?

Well it's reassuring to know that as the world population rises, the UK remains constant. That'll keep the Greens happy at least.