Wednesday 18 March 2009

Unemployment Passes 2 Million

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7947766.stm

Yes I know it has, I'm one of them and I have been for over 6 months, although I doubt I'm on official statistics. Thats because I'm no longer paid jobseekers allowance. Thats because my wife works. However, I'm still obliged to seek work and sign on every fortnight in order to have my National Insurance credited.

The thing is, I know the job market intimately now. I can see the people pouring into the jobcentre, I can see the trickle of jobs drying up (especially in the past month).

I know that the queues aren't getting shorter, in fact they are getting longer. I know the next set of figures will be even worse.

Its frightening to see the speed of the increase in unemployment and the rapidity with which jobs have dried up in the last month.

I know from bitter experience that when Gordon Brown says that there are 500,000 jobs out there, he's dead wrong.

Update:

The BBC have a nifty graphical map here: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7789784.stm that shows the trends of unemployment since September last year. Seems the North is getting clobbered badly if those ststistics are to be believed.
Posted by Mark The Skint Sailor at 18:22

2 comments:

  1. Pavlov's Cat19 March 2009 at 13:04

    The land lady at my local (SE London) told me they had 70 applications for one full time bar position (£6.00ph 48 hrs a week) from a 1 week jobcentre advert. I was one of them.
    I didn't get the job because they thought with my experience and qualifications, I wouldn't stay for long enough and as soon as a better job came along I'd be off.

    There are no better jobs , why do think we're all applying, was my retort.

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  2. Mark The Skint Sailor20 March 2009 at 00:42

    I expect there are thousands out there having the same sort of experience.
    In the past month the number of jobs that I could apply for have reduced dramatically, probably a third of what they were before. Low skilled jobs seem to have dropped off the map completely as I suspect that firms get enough applicants from their own workforce's network.
    Care worker positions still seem to be strong: we still have elderly and disabled to care for.

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