Unemployment Rate Near 6 Year Low

Unemployment Rate Near 6 Year Low.

The Office for National Statistics (ONS) has released its data for the three months to July. The data shows that the number of people claiming job seekers allowance moved closer to a 6 year low.

Over the quarter, unemployment fell from 6.5% in May to 6.4%, this was the lowest since late 2008. The number of people without a job fell by 132,000 to 2.08 million.

Despite an increase of those being employed, wages excluding bonuses only rose by 0.6% in June compared with last year. This was the slowest rise since 2001 when records started being recorded.

The ONS has said the data for wage rises has been affected by a number of employees deferring bonus payments last year until after the top level of tax was cut from 50p to 45p.

There were 820,000 more people in employment compared with the same point last year, meaning that there were 30.60 million people in employment.