According to the Guardian:
According to research from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and the Centre for Cities thinktank, large levels of “hidden” unemployment in towns and cities across Britain are excluded from the official government statistics.
The study found that more than 3 million people are missing from the headline unemployment rate because they report themselves as economically inactive to government labour force surveys, saying that they believe no jobs are available.
Three immediate comments arise.
First, this is glaringly obviously true. The statistics have been manipulated. That's hardly news, or a surprise.
Second, this still massively understates under-employment and unemployment as millions of self-employed people are only marginally economically active in work that pays very little. And we also know that there are millions of marginal employments that are exploitative and unproductive for those who endure them. This is, then, only the tip of the iceberg on the scale of the real issue facing many in the UK, which official statistics seek to deny.
Third, this suggests that all the people required to deliver a Green New Deal are out there, waiting to work. They will need training, of course. That will be essential. But the opportunity to create a much better economy exists.
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OECD has finally noticed.
Well hallelujah !
Yes, the shameless manipulation of employment statistics is well known, and yes the Green New Deal is badly needed.
GND = socialism and state control by the back door and you desperately trying to stay relevant.
As for effecting material climate change the impact of a GND is a rounding error in the grand scheme of things. It is so obvious you are hijacking the green issue to impose an ideological agenda.
Tell me what aspect of the green issue does not interface with a political / ideological agenda?
And come to that, what part of life does not?
Or why tackling climate change is not the thing to do?
Well, imagine in the very unlikely case that tackling anthropogenic climate change DOESN’T make much difference at all: what would the outcome be? Whoa, a world where we use its resources FAR more sensibly and sustainably, a world where we share those resources more equally, and where there’s a moderate hope of spreading fulfilment as well as reward so much more widely. You’re right, that would be terrible! Best not take the chance, eh…?
Oh, and if you think that where we are now is not the direct result of a very focussed agenda, I may have a bridge I can sell you…
🙂
http://sites.uci.edu/climatechangenews/files/2018/07/Screen-Shot-2018-07-19-at-11.39.10-PM.png
🙂
jj burnell says:
“GND = socialism and state control by the back door…..”
No. Front door actually. It is the legitimate business of government to exert control. If you took time to investigate what GND proposals are you would recognise an important role for the private sector and individual enterprise is very much part of the rationale. Job Guarantee for example which is widely accepted as being an inherent constituent component of GND contains provisions for the type of upskilling that will be essential if the private sector is to survive and meet new challenges in an increasingly roboticised business world of manufacturing and commerce generally. You will look long and hard through this blog’s archive to find proponents of a political/economic model which is not a mixed economy.
“…….and you desperately trying to stay relevant.”
I know who should be worried about on-going relevance in a rapidly changing world. 🙂
I find it quite odd all the people thinking I just jumped on a green bandwagon
I co-wrote the Green New Deal
How much more green can you get?
I’m guessing you’re the same troll who has hidden behind the names of various other punk icons over the last few months. The irony isn’t lost on me, at any rate. FFS, you can’t even spell Jean-Jacques Burnel’s name properly!
He wouldn’t be slow to disagree with you. Probably with his fists rather than in an intellectual debate.
We are customers only.
We are customers to private companies – obviously to buy things we have to be customers. But we have become customers to the companies we work for – where we might ‘buy benefits’ (eh?) or services like HR and pensions are kindly managed for us (offshore), and that’s just when you are actually employed – something that seems to be a precious commodity. But worse, we are now merely customers to our governments – to be sold things and sold out. It’s a constant pay-out.
Where they think we get the money to keep paying when companies have no reason give workers any ‘benefits’ or give decent salary levels, or any work at all, etc. I don’t know. How they (the government) think they can run a country when the country (the people) have nothing left to give. Gross mismanagement and a political system that doesn’t allow us any other choices. I hate neo-liberalism.
I wholeheartedly agree.
I know people who went from one salaried job to up to 3 or 4 ‘self-employed’ ones just to end exactly where they were or worse.
I am probably well out of date here as now retired for a few years. When I had to apply for Jobseekers ( or whatever it is now called ) for two different periods I was – both times – fairly soon ‘bumped’ on to a ‘course’ to improve my CV interview skills & c, and take training on e.g. computer studies. Apparently I was then not ‘unemployed’ as far as the stats were concerned even though still receiving the benefit. I haven’t believed the numbers ever since.
Quite so…
I’d probably have to put myself in some/all of those categories.
We must be at or close to full-employment (not actually 0% but near it) – technically. But from my school boy economics that means; upward pressure on pay as employers try and attract the best, anybody who wants a job can get one such is demand and rubbish employers are expunged from the system because people can move easily.
Don’t really see any of it.
The official statistic of employment is based on a survey under rules determined by the International Labour Organisation {ILO] to provide consistency following the Thatcher years when the method of calculation was changed eighteen times. From the article in the Guardian this survey dramatically understates the level of unemployment as you explain. I would maybe suggest that the information from the survey can be too subjectively interpreted to reach a desired outcome.
What percentage of the population are surveyed?
Are those subject to benefit sanctions included?
Are those doing a number of jobs counted as one or more?
What is the number of hours worked before a job is counted as full time?
Is there a correlation between the figures and the total number of hours worked in the economy as provided by the ONS?
What is the average number of hours worked per worker each year and does this trend with the employment figures?
Questions, I know, but I do not trust these figures either.
Given that we each have a National Insurance number, HMRC have our earnings details and sources plus data from others, surely a sufficiently large sample could be generated to be able to extrapolate the figure to represent a much more accurate measure of the level of unemployment.
One hour per week apparently. https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-46264291
Believe it or not, it’s actually one hour a fortnight
Which is staggering…
I can totally relate to this ‘on the ground’, so to speak, and it is the tip of the iceberg, depending on where you set the lines of ‘economically inactive’.
I’m self-employed, running my own shop. I work approx. 60 per week, and this year I’ll once again back to not paying income tax next year, as my income will be below the threshold.
I have a number of customers who will buy a birthday gift for a friend or relative, well in advance, and pay for it over a number of weeks, with sometimes an apology for having to miss a week because their income wasn’t as they’d hoped. I’m talking about items which will cost between £10 to £20.
These customers are employed, sometimes with more than one job.
They may be ‘in work’, but due to zero hour contracts and very low pay, they won’t be paying tax either, and their contribution to the economy will be the bare minimum.
I suggest that the figures for unemployment, however they are calculated, are just a small part of the overall problem of economic activity.
Thanks
Good luck….
So who are these people ?
Homemakers and people with caring responsibilities who have chosen not to work?
Students on demanding full time courses who have no capacity to work?
People who have taken early retirement and don’t want to work?
Are these really the kind of people who would take jobs fitting double glazing or solar panels?
You know that question is ridiculous
Very politely, if you want to comment engage your brain first