Full-Time Employment Deficit

An estimated 455, 000 Scots want to find full-time employment but are unable to do so.

The STUC has published a report on the state of the Scottish labour market.

It says politicians on both sides of the border are constantly 'boasting' about historic high levels of employment when thousands of people are struggling to make ends meet.

Grahame Smith, STUC General Secretary said: “This report provides a comprehensive overview of the state of the Scottish Labour Market and provides an estimate of ‘Scotland’s Full-Time Employment Deficit’.

“It is shocking that an estimated 455,000 people in Scotland want but are unable to find full-time employment. It is unacceptable that politicians are too busy boasting about historically high levels of employment to bother about the underlying, negative trends affecting hundreds of thousands of workers. The excessively optimistic scenarios painted by both the Scottish and UK Government are too reliant on headline measures of employment and unemployment which no longer provide an accurate gauge of labour demand.

“It is essential that the Scottish Government launches a significant research project to better understand trends in youth, women’s and older peoples’ employment. The labour market emerging from the recession is looking quite different to that which prevailed prior to 2008. Current trends must be fully understood in order that policy interventions are as effective as possible”.