15‑21 Dec 2014 Decent Jobs Week shines a light on our growing jobs crisis.

Only one in every forty new jobs since the recession is for a full-time employee, says TUC

Decent Work Week

The share of UK jobs accounted for by full-time employees fell during the recession and has failed to recover, according to new analysis published today (Wednesday) by the TUC.

The analysis shows that the share of full-time employee jobs was 64 per cent in 2008 and fell to 62 per cent in 2014. This is equivalent to a shortfall of 669,000 full-time employees.

Just one in every forty of the net jobs added to the economy between 2008 and 2014 has been a full-time employee job. Over the same period 24 in every 40 net jobs added have been self-employed, and 26 in every 40 have been part-time.

While new employment figures due to be published today are expected to show an overall increase in employment, they are not expected to substantially reverse the reduced share for full-time employee jobs in the labour market.

The TUC recognises that part-time and self-employment are both important options for many people. However, despite recent economic growth the number of part-time employees who say they want full-time hours is still twice what it was before the recession at 1.3 million people.

The TUC believes that the rise in self-employment is at least in part a result of people who are unable to find employee jobs being forced into false self-employment – an exploitation of workers used by some companies to evade taxes and avoid respecting employment rights and entitlements such as holiday pay, sick pay and pensions.

TUC General Secretary Frances O’Grady said: “While more people are in work there are still far too few full-time employee jobs for everyone who wants one. It means many working families are on substantially lower incomes as they can only find reduced hours jobs or low-paid self-employment.

“The Chancellor has said he wants full employment, but that should mean full-time jobs for everyone who wants them. At the moment the economy is still not creating enough full-time employee jobs to meet demand.”

NOTES TO EDITORS:

Change in labour force composition between January-March 2008 and June-August 2014 (source: ONS Labour Force Survey)

Total

Employees working full-time

Employees working  part-time

Self-employed working

full-time

Self-employed working

part-time

No. of jobs

Jan-Mar 2008

29,683,561

19,122,857

6,459,020

2,945,631

931,944

Composition Jan-Mar 2008

64.42%

21.76%

9.92%

3.14%

No. of jobs Jun-Aug 2014

30,763,393

19,148,756

6,837,069

3,254,710

1,268,477

Composition Jun-Aug 2014

62.25%

22.22%

10.58%

4.12%

Increase (jobs)

2008-2014

1,079,831

25,898

378,050

309,079

336,533

Percentage change

2008-2014

0.14%

5.85%

10.49%

36.11%

Share of

total increase

2008-2014

100.00%

2.40%

35.01%

28.62%

31.17%

– For the composition of full-time employees to be as high in June-August 2014 as it was in January-March 2008, the labour market needs 669,000 part-time and self-employed workers to become full-time employees.

– The number of part-time workers who said they are working part-time because they cannot find full-time hours was 705,000 in January-March 2008, and 1,351,000 in June-August 2014 (ONS).