Are the Tories doing a good job with the economy? Lets look at the statistics on either side.
-Unemployment in the UK has risen about 2 million to just under 2.5 million in the last three months, the increase being 49,000. Further rises are expected by analysists, and 2,000 more public sector jobs have yet to be cut.
-Inflation has risen from 3.3% to 3.7% since November. The VAT increase may cause it to rise further. The target the government set for inflation was 2%.
-Average earnings in the UK have rose by 2.1% "in the year to November." It's unclear whether they are still rising, or falling, or just not doing much.
-The number of people on jobseeker's allowance fell by 4,100 since November. The total number of people on JA is now 1.46 million.
So. Yeah.
I don't think it looks good, overall. If you combine the last statistic with the first, it just means that more people are getting neither salary nor benefits, which is not a good thing. The third one would be a good thing, if we knew for sure that average wage was still rising.
What's amusing is that Cameron says that "any rise in unemployment is a huge concern," but it's obviously not a huge enough concern to stop taking away jobs.
Rising inflation. Rising unemployment. Presuming it doesn't get better quickly, which admittedly it might, then I wonder how they're going to justify this come next election? And more importantly, whether people will listen?
Not much else to add to that, I don't think. So over and out!
Rising inflation. Rising unemployment. conventional economic theory says you can't cut both at the same time because they are caused by one another...
ReplyDeleteyou either need to raise unemployment to cut inflation or raise inflation to cut unemployment, either way someone's going to suffer.
As a side note if inflation is at 3,7% and pay rises are 2.7% that's a 1% pay CUT in real terms