Good News Ahoy!

Graham_Devon

Not even attempting to suggest this isn't good news!

Just wanted to fan the flames of the argument going on above

Beware of headlines that tell you unemployment has risen or fallen.

On Wednesday, official figures from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) showed a 79,000 fall in unemployment, which was dutifully reported across news outlets.

But is it really telling us what we think it is?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-34486717

michaels

Interesting that although central estimate of unemployment is up for each of the last 3 months, because of the sharp drops during the previous quarter the quarter on quarter figure is still down. The corollary is that in the next two months we could see flat/small falls in unemployment but the quarterly figure will be up....

I actually prefer the claimant count as an indicator, although obviously floored by changes to eligibility rules it is a better live indicator of the economy.

Overall it appears that growth has slowed since the start of the year, the question is whether it is natural fluctuations or whether the head winds from international growth falling (or PPI payments starting to peter out) mean the economy will pick up pace again.

The consensus view is that the increase in real wages will keep the economy moving forward. I think the mainstream are still underplaying distributional effects; if it is the higher paid who are getting the wage increases (as immigrant labour continues to surpress wages at the bottom of the distribution) then the wage increases may well be used to save towards pensions (as incentivised by the tax system) rather than spent and thus will not replace the fading PPI demand boost.

Thrugelmir

danothy wrote: »

I know there's nothing in the stats about the 19% of new employment that isn't full time, but we all know that things are utterly terrible, so it must be zero hour contracts. They'd have said they weren't otherwise. It's obvious. And utterly terrible.

Plenty of people are happy working under such arrangements surveys have revealed. Sometimes any work is better than no work at all. Eire's economy is booming yet unemployment is still around the 10% -11% level.

danothy

Thrugelmir wrote: »

Plenty of people are happy working under such arrangements surveys have revealed. Sometimes any work is better than no work at all.

We also all know that zero hour contracts are called zero hour contracts because people work zero hours while employed on them. Not sure how that is better than no work at all.

CLAPTON

Generali wrote: »

Where do you think the gaps between changes in unemployment, employment and economic inactivity come from?

If you are that obsessed about this subject, which about 30 seconds glancing at your back catalogue of posting shows you are, the ONS are very open about how they put together their data.

You can email Richard here:

[EMAIL="labour.market@ons.gsi.gov.uk"]labour.market@ons.gsi.gov.uk[/EMAIL]

Or you could try reading the ONS's guide to interpreting labour market stats:

http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/dcp171766_294390.pdf

The data do include migrants. If you don't believe me then bug someone else about it because I can't be bothered.

you are getting a like obsessive.


the base population and its change over the period is clearly relevant to the interpretation of the statistics


stop trying to see racism in everything posted.

Generali

Graham_Devon wrote: »

Not even attempting to suggest this isn't good news!

Just wanted to fan the flames of the argument going on above


http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-34486717

It's a great article and gets to the heart of the matter which is that almost every monthly change in unemployment is within the margin of error for the poll so strictly speaking the fall in unemployment is just noise.

In mitigation however, with a time series like this, the trend is your friend. If this month's unemployment fall comes after a series of falls in unemployment then it is quite likely to be a continuation of the trend although only time will tell.

Generali

CLAPTON wrote: »

you are getting a like obsessive.


the base population and its change over the period is clearly relevant to the interpretation of the statistics


stop trying to see racism in everything posted.

You are the only person to have raised racism. I answered your question and suggested further avenues for research.

I'll answer it again: the figures include new immigrants to the UK or at least should depending on how efficient the ONS's sampling is. If you want further information please contact Richard on the email address above.

michaels

Generali wrote: »

It's a great article and gets to the heart of the matter which is that almost every monthly change in unemployment is within the margin of error for the poll so strictly speaking the fall in unemployment is just noise.

In mitigation however, with a time series like this, the trend is your friend. If this month's unemployment fall comes after a series of falls in unemployment then it is quite likely to be a continuation of the trend although only time will tell.

Except if you look at the chart you can see that the monthly data does not give the same picture as the quarter on quarter figures that are published. The monthly figures shows a small increase in unemployment for each of the last three months (trend is a friend?) but due to the larger drops over the three months of the previous quarter, especially the final one, the three month on three month is down. Once those larger falls drop out of the data in 2 months time then employment may well appear to be increasing even if we actually return to small falls (all calcs refer to the central estimate).

Graham_Devon

Out of interest - I know someone who sells on ebay as a "business". She only sells a few items per week. However, she then claims tax credits for the majority (I'd say 98% of her income).


Is she "employed"? Or is she in that other group of 20% or so of people?

If she is employed according to the figures, is there any way of taking this into account? Afterall, if it wasn't for tax credits, essentially she'd be unemployed (until she and hundreds of others in her boat found a job) as she can't make a living selling a few items picked up at charity shops and car boots each month.

I believe the rules were changed about 3 years back to allow for this type of arrangement? I've also seen examples on other areas of the board where people do ironing or cleaning a couple of times a week which entitles them to tax credits?

Generali

Graham_Devon wrote: »

Out of interest - I know someone who sells on ebay as a "business". She only sells a few items per week. However, she then claims tax credits for the majority (I'd say 98% of her income).


Is she "employed"? Or is she in that other group of 20% or so of people?

If she is employed according to the figures, is there any way of taking this into account? Afterall, if it wasn't for tax credits, essentially she'd be unemployed (until she and hundreds of others in her boat found a job) as she can't make a living selling a few items picked up at charity shops and car boots each month.

I believe the rules were changed about 3 years back to allow for this type of arrangement? I've also seen examples on other areas of the board where people do ironing or cleaning a couple of times a week which entitles them to tax credits?

She'll be counted as self-employed in the data.

As to whether that is a problem or not depends on whether your friend is an exception or in a common position. Certainly self-employment has risen but that is meaningless of itself.

I'm not aware of any research into what we could possibly uncharitably call 'sham self-employed' people. I'd be happy if anyone could steer me in the direction of some.