Wages rising at fastest rate in a decade

UK wages are increasing at their joint-fastest rate in a decade, with unemployment remaining low at 4 per cent.

The figures, published on Tuesday (19 February) by the Office for National Statistics (ONS), showed that wages outpaced inflation for the eleventh month in a row.

The new figures confirmed that 2018 was a year of widespread employment opportunity showing:

• A record high employment rate for people from ethnic minority backgrounds of 66.2%
• 145,000 more disabled people found work since last year, an overall increase of 930,000 in the last five years
• More women are in the workplace than ever before, 15.31 million. The female employment rate is also a record - 71.4%

Northern Powerhouse Minister, Jake Berry MP for Rossendale, said: “The government is supporting hard-working people across the North West and the whole Northern Powerhouse to build their careers and businesses.

“Since 2010 unemployment is down 51%, there are 107,600 more small businesses and 652,000 people have started apprenticeships. We are rebalancing the economy, so it works for everyone.”

Minister of State for Employment Alok Sharma said: “While the global economy is facing many challenges, particularly in sectors like manufacturing, these figures show the underlying resilience of our jobs market – once again delivering record employment levels.”

With vacancies at a joint record high, the data also shows job opportunities continue to be out there, so find your perfect job via Rochdale Online:

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*Employment rate: The number of people in employment in the UK is measured by the Labour Force Survey (LFS) and consists of people aged 16 and over who did one hour or more of paid work per week (as an employee or self-employed), those who had a job that they were temporarily away from, those on government-supported training and employment programmes, and those doing unpaid family work. 

Employment is a different, but similar, concept to jobs. Employment is a measure of people, and a person with more than one job would therefore be counted once in the employment estimates.