Rate reached 5.0 percent from September to November
In Great Britain, unemployment continued to rise against the backdrop of the corona crisis. In the three months to November, the unemployment rate rose by 0.1 percentage points to 5.0 percent, as the ONS statistics office announced in London on Tuesday. This is the fifth increase in a row and the highest rate since 2016. Analysts had expected a slightly stronger increase to 5.1 percent on average.
A comparison with February 2020, the month before the introduction of tough measures in the fight against the corona pandemic, shows how much the corona crisis is now burdening the British labor market. At that time the unemployment rate was only 4.0 percent.
The number of employees fell in the three months to November by 88,000, as the message also said. In the three months to October, the decline was significantly greater at 144,000.
Despite the higher unemployment, the statistics office reported an unexpectedly strong increase in the pay of employees. As the announcement said, weekly wages and salaries rose 3.6 percent in the three months to November, a little more than analysts had expected.
