Acocks Green’s Claimant Unemployment fell by 32 to 718 in October. This is a fall of 282 over the past year, reducing the claimant rate from 7.7% to 5.5% in that time. The level of long term unemployed resumed its downward trend, falling by 10 to 290 and the number of youth claimants also fell by 10 to 180.
Nationally, unemployment fell by 115,000 in the three months to September to 1.96 million. Total employment rose to 30.7m, another new record. What grabbed most attention was that real wages showed the first rise in 5 years – a mere 0.1% growth, but a welcome step in the right direction, with more likely to come as inflation continues to weaken.