Labour Market Profile - March 2022 - EU Skills

Labour Market Profile – March 2022

This latest labour market update summarises the state of the UK labour market in the three months to February 2022. It is based on data published by the Office for National Statistics.

Labour Market Profile - March 2022
Labour Market Profile – March 2022

The most recent data show the labour market continuing to recover from the impact of coronavirus pandemic:

  • The number of Payrolled employees increased by 0.9% over the past month to 29.7million
  • The employment rate increased by 0.1% over the quarter to 75.6%
  • The unemployment rate decreased by 0.2% over the quarter to 3.9%
  • The economic inactivity rate increased by 0.1% over the quarter to 21.3%
  • Redundancies fell by 29,000 over the quarter to 68,000
  • Vacancies reached another record high of 1,318,000 during the quarter
    • In the Electricity & Gas industry, the number of vacancies fell by 14% during the quarter (though still 16% higher than a year ago) to c5,000
    • In the Water supply, sewerage, waste & remediation activities industry, the number of vacancies fell by 4% during the quarter (though still 149% higher than a year ago) to c8,000
  • Total hours worked increased by 4.7% over the quarter to 1.03billion hours (though still 23million hours lower than before the pandemic)
  • Earnings growth in average total pay (including bonuses) was 4.8% and regular pay (excluding bonuses) was 3.8%
    • In real terms (adjusted for inflation), growth in total pay was 0.1% on the quarter, although regular pay fell by -1.0%

The Office for National Statistics’ full update on the state of the labour market in March 2022 can be found here.

The next update will be on 12th April 2022.

For further information about the labour market, migration or regional labour market indications, please email Rob Murphy, our in-house strategic workforce planning consultant.