Latest Articles By Simon Collyer

Labour Force Survey (LFS) employment rate decreased over the quarter while unemployment and economic inactivity rates remain unchanged. There was a decrease in the employment rate (68.7%) over the quarter and over the year.  The economic inactiv...

The Joseph Rowntree Foundation has released this report on Lone Parents on Low incomes Single parents on low incomes are being hit hard by rising living costs and the benefit freeze. How do they cope with the impact of low pay and insecurity? Insecur...

HMRC raised £574.9 billion of tax revenues this year1, an increase of £38.1 billion (7.1%) on 2015-16 and paid out £39.1 billion in benefits and credits (approximately one-fifth of the government's total benefit expenditure). The ta...

Commenting on the publication today (Thursday) of the European Union (Withdrawal) Bill, which brings EU laws — including workers’ rights — into UK law , TUC General Secretary Frances O’Grady said: “This is a Downing Stre...

Nearly 4.2 million people (full-time equivalent - FTE) in the European Union (EU) were working in the environmental economy in 2014, almost 1.4 million more than fifteen years ago. 60% of these jobs concerned activities related to environmental prote...

Working families who are "just about managing" are worse off than they were last year, despite Theresa May's pledge to focus her efforts on helping this group, new research has found. A report by the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, an anti-poverty chari...

Jobs figures published today showing that unemployment is at a record low in Scotland and substantially lower than the UK average have been welcomed by the SNP. Over the quarter of March to May 2017, the unemployment rate dropped to 3.8%. Meanwhile t...

The Taylor Report on the Gig economy is out today. There are seven recommendations, the main suggestion that has grabbed the headlines is ending paying people in cash. The idea Mr Taylor, Chief Executive of the RSA since 2006 is suggesting,...

UK labour productivity, as measured by output per hour, declined by 0.5% in the first three months of this year, according to new figures from the Office for National Statistics. It is the first fall since the end of 2015, commenting on the news Shad...

It is now over a year since the government increased the minimum amount of debt necessary to petition for bankruptcy.  The threshold is now £5,000 (it was previously £750). This has led to a reduction in the number of people in Engla...