Unemployment Down 0.2% To 8%

The unemployment rate fell 0.2% to 8% between April and June 2012 leaving 2.56m people aged over 16 unemployed, down 46,000 on the quarter. The employment rate was 71%, up 0.4%. The number of full-time workers increased by 130,000 to 21.41m and part-time workers increased by 71,000 to 8.07m. The economic inactivity rate for 16-64 year olds was 22.6% the lowest figure since 1991.

Average total pay was £469/week in June 2012. Average regular pay was £442/week. Total hours worked in the economy was 934.7m/week or an average of 31.7 hours/week.

There were 472,000 job vacancies in the three months to July 2012, up 10,000 on the previous three months, or 1.8 job vacancies per 100 employee jobs.