Economy getting into trouble

[cymtriks]

From the BBC website

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/4623500.stm

Jobless total at three-year high

Fewer jobs were available during the three months to November
The number of people out of work in the UK rose by 111,000 to a three-year high of 1.53 million in the three months to November, official figures have shown.
The rise was the biggest for 12 years and lifted the unemployment rate to 5%.

The Office for National Statistics (ONS) figures also showed that the number of job vacancies fell 12,700 in the period to 606,500.

Meanwhile, the number of people out of work and claiming benefit rose by 7,200 to 909,100 last month.

The manufacturing sector continued to suffer, the ONS figures showed, with 109,000 jobs in the sector lost over the three-month period.

The ONS figures also revealed that the number of people classed as "economically inactive" rose to its highest level since records began in 1971.

The figure - which includes students, people looking after relatives and those who have given up looking for a job - rose 25,000 during the three months to November to 7.94 million.

The ONS data also revealed that average earnings grew by 3.4% in the year to November, down from the 3.6% rate recorded the month before.

[Jaglover]

Yep, and unemployment would be even higher if the government hadn't hired 100,000's of people to sit around doing 'non-jobs'

[timmy30]

Que the undiginified haste with which Gordon Brown budles Tony out of the door of No 10, and hops into his primimisterial shoes.

[scorp]

Im sure Prudent G will gobble up any slack in the labour market by employing them all in the civil service, as per bloody usual.

Good to see our resident new-labour cynics, JagLover and Timmy30 replying promptly

>> Edited by scorp on Wednesday 18th January 17:15

[scorp]

Einion Yrth said:

Fewer and fewer taxpayers paying for more and more parasites,whacko!

parasites = new-labour voters.

[ATG]

bit premature to say we're getting into trouble. The labour market has been tight as a gnat's chuff for quite a few years ... according to previous estimates of the NAIRU, for those of an anally retentive disposition. Wonder if Gordo will choose to quote Normo Lamont? Probably not. Anyway, there scope for a bit of monetary easing from the BoE. But it would be nice if Italy, France and Germany would be kind enough to try growing a bit. It makes life hard when your trading partners' economies are perpetually stuck in neutral.

[anonymous-user]

scorp said:

Im sure Prudent G will gobble up any slack in the labour market by employing them all in the civil service, as per bloody usual.

Undoubtedly. Complete with full perks.

My 18 year old daughter is currently having a gap year and is working for the civil service. She is on a max 51 week contract and is still entitled to a non contributory pension while she is there!!

[vetteheadracer]

Housing market is "soft" because of rising interest rates and "stamp duty" which is beyond a joke.
Unemployment rising.
jobs market struggling.

Sounds like RECESSION to me.....but of course Gordon Brown doesn't know what this word means.......

[Einion Yrth]

I wondered when the conservatives made such a poor fist of the last general election if they hadn't seen the way the economic wind blew and didn't wish to be at the helm as the ship of state foundered.

[chris watton]

Its been in trouble for a good while, and I don't for one second believe their total unemployment figures! Why did we have over 3 million unemployed in the early 80s, when you could still walk into virtually any factory and get a job, as we still manufactured back then, but now, with little to no manufacturing base left, unemployment is lower?? I think not!

[Einion Yrth]

Ah, but these days they're not unemployed they're incapacitated.

[ATG]

chris watton said:

Its been in trouble for a good while, and I don't for one second believe their total unemployment figures! Why did we have over 3 million unemployed in the early 80s, when you could still walk into virtually any factory and get a job, as we still manufactured back then, but now, with little to no manufacturing base left, unemployment is lower?? I think not!

God forgive me for using the phrase, but "adding value" is the key. You have to sell whatever it is you sell for more than it cost you to produce. It makes absolutely no difference if the thing you make is a bent bit of metal, a piece of music, an advert or a set of accounts. There is nothing special about manufacturing.

[chris watton]

ATG said:

chris watton said: Its been in trouble for a good while, and I don't for one second believe their total unemployment figures! Why did we have over 3 million unemployed in the early 80s, when you could still walk into virtually any factory and get a job, as we still manufactured back then, but now, with little to no manufacturing base left, unemployment is lower?? I think not! God forgive me for using the phrase, but "adding value" is the key. You have to sell whatever it is you sell for more than it cost you to produce. It makes absolutely no difference if the thing you make is a bent bit of metal, a piece of music, an advert or a set of accounts. There is nothing special about manufacturing.

You are kidding, arn't you? If a country doesn't manufacture goods to sell to other countries, and it's own population, it will suffer. The whole UK economy can't be propped up by civil servents, IT jobs, service industry jobs and wholesaleing indefinitely, can it?
If we end up importing almost everything we buy, all we're doing in the longrun is making another country richer and more economically stable at the expense of ours, as we have no control of the costs! Is that right?

[loafer]

For the last few years Brown had stacks of money to invest to stimulate some economic growth, now his surplus has run out and hes hit the borrowing limit the economy is running on empty. Look out for a big tax hike on somthing in the comming months.

[scorp]

Einion Yrth said:

Ah, but these days they're not unemployed they're incapacitated.

The old moving the goalposts trick, jesus our politicians are useless aren't they. I suppose most of the unemployed will be recategorised as "job seekers" or something to further artificially reduce this statistic.

[chris watton]

scorp said:

Einion Yrth said: Ah, but these days they're not unemployed they're incapacitated. The old moving the goalposts trick, jesus our politicians are useless aren't they. I suppose most of the unemployed will be recategorised as "job seekers" or something to further artificially reduce this statistic.

LOL, so, are the government statistics trying to make it seem as though we have, oh, I don't know, at a very rough guess, over 3 million people that are out of work because they're 'incapacitated' - not fit for work? If that is only slightly near the mark, then there's only one direction this country's going, and it sure as hell isn't up!

[2 sMoKiN bArReLs]

But for all that, life has never been so good.

[scorp]

chris watton said:

then there's only one direction this country's going, and it sure as hell isn't up!

God have mercy on the tax payers, i'll expect we'll all be on a communism tax rate of 99.9% to bail out this s**t hole of a country.

At least Prudent G will have appointed a new chancellor to blame it all on by then.

[scorp]

2 sMoKiN bArReLs said:

But for all that, life has never been so good.

Not for a lot of people i know.