Unemployment keeps rising across UK
Monday May 07, 201202:51 PM GMT
The Center for Economics and Business Research (CEBR) said the overall jobless rate could hit 10.7 percent by 2016, which would be the worst rate of unemployment since the country emerged from a recession in the mid 1990’s.
The CEBR warns that parts of the UK reliant on the public sector could be worse hit.
The coalition government’s economic policy remains focused on austerity, despite criticism that it is not working and the policy focus should shift to measures to encourage economic growth.
The impact will be strongest in Northern Ireland, where almost one in three people work in the public sector. Other parts of the UK that have a higher than average proportion of public sector jobs are Wales, Scotland and the North East of England.
The rate of unemployment in the North East is currently at 12 percent and this is expected to rise to 13 percent by 2016. Yorkshire and the Humber is another area of England that is particularly reliant on public sector jobs and cutbacks in the public sector and weak private sector job growth will increase the rate of unemployment to 11 percent.
"Five more years of pain are expected for much of the UK, with unemployment continuing to rise in almost every region”, said Rob Harbron, one of the report's authors.
"The outlook is tough for UK households, particularly those in places with a high dependency on public sector employment”, he added.
"Family budgets are being squeezed between the pressures of rising unemployment, low earnings growth and stubbornly high inflation."
