UK Unemployment on the up!

steadysaver

And so it begins

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/7447791.stm

mystic_trev

steadysaver wrote: »

And so it begins continues

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/7447791.stm

The figures are also masked by the increasing amount on Incapacity benefit. And there was me thinking the Guberment was trying to get more of these people back to employment. :rolleyes:

steadysaver

I dont think the government know's its !!!! from its elbow these days and they are about to get a slap on the wrist from the European Commission.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/7447531.stm

Oh dear Gordon, where did it all go wrong....

PasturesNew

I suspect there will be a lot of "hidden unemployment" coming through in the next year or so.

Over the last 30 years people have had to live further and further away from their jobs, to be able to afford either housing that's affordable, or the house they want (dream house in the country).

With the price of fuel expected to rocket, many of these people will be re-assessing the cost of getting to work compared to what they get paid. As a result some of them will be choosing lower paid jobs closer to home. The jobs they leave might become a silent statistic as their boss decides to bumble along without them. They might see it as a way of saving money by not replacing them.

steadysaver

PasturesNew wrote: »

The jobs they leave might become a silent statistic as their boss decides to bumble along without them. They might see it as a way of saving money by not replacing them.

I certainly know of a few incidents where this is the case.

slipthru

mystic_trev wrote: »

The figures are also masked by the increasing amount on Incapacity benefit. And there was me thinking the Guberment was trying to get more of these people back to employment. :rolleyes:

Double edged sword, they stuck alot of people on to incapacity to make the the unemployment figures lower a few years back and now they want them to go back to work. With unemployment on the up this could get interesting.

poppysarah

Replacing full time jobs with part time work and then employing people who get tax credits is the new way.

Generali

slipthru wrote: »

Double edged sword, they stuck alot of people on to incapacity to make the the unemployment figures lower a few years back and now they want them to go back to work. With unemployment on the up this could get interesting.

My feeling is that we're rapidly approaching the point where the welfare budget is simply too big - you can't have a situation where over half the population is living off the work of the rest, it's not tenable.

Increasing numbers of people are going to retire over the next few years so the writing has to be on the wall for the indolent and to a lesser extent people that are 'too ill' to work.

If vast numbers of pensionners are going to be kept for increasing lengths of time at the expense of the taxpayer then savings will have to be made elsewhere. Life expectancy at age 65 is now 17 years for a man and 20 years for a woman. There is no fund set up to pay for these pensions. Link

WTF?_2

Generali wrote: »

My feeling is that we're rapidly approaching the point where the welfare budget is simply too big - you can't have a situation where over half the population is living off the work of the rest, it's not tenable.

Yet the public sector has endured for years......

Generali

!!!!!!? wrote: »

Yet the public sector has endured for years......

It's true what you say but my belief is the history of welfare in this country since the Poor Law in 1601(?) is one of benefits slowly becoming more generous and widely available before the whole thing is quickly and dramatically tightened up.

If you try to raise taxes too high then you'll just succeed in driving away the productive parts of the economy making your problems with paying welfare bills worse. That's always been a problem but all the more so in these days of globalisation.

slipthru

Generali wrote: »

My feeling is that we're rapidly approaching the point where the welfare budget is simply too big - you can't have a situation where over half the population is living off the work of the rest, it's not tenable.

Increasing numbers of people are going to retire over the next few years so the writing has to be on the wall for the indolent and to a lesser extent people that are 'too ill' to work.

If vast numbers of pensionners are going to be kept for increasing lengths of time at the expense of the taxpayer then savings will have to be made elsewhere. Life expectancy at age 65 is now 17 years for a man and 20 years for a woman. There is no fund set up to pay for these pensions. Link

I guess they will be raising the age of retirment soon again, and i agree the writing has to be on the wall for the long term unemployed at some point.