IER News & blogs

The Working Futures 2017-2027 projections, produced by the IER in collaboration with Cambridge Econometrics, were published by the Department for Education in February 2020.

The IER has now created a new web portal from which all the reports plus all the Excel workbooks containing the projections for UK nations and regions and Local Enterprise Partnerships within England can be downloaded.

Please note that these projections are based on employment estimates derived from published labour market data. They are not precise predictions of future employment levels, but represent the most likely trajectory of labour market change, given long-term trends in the economy and explicit assumptions about likely future economic change.

The forecasts were created when it was expected there would be a negotiated Brexit and before the Covid-19 pandemic, which has resulted in considerable disruption to the UK and world economic system.

Unemployment and scarcity of jobs have long been important concerns for policymakers in developing countries (World Bank, 2012). These issues are crucial for India as the country is home to the world’s largest population of young people ready to participate in the labour force (UNFPA report, 2019). The current situation caused by the Covid-19 outbreak and the subsequent countrywide lockdown is certain to affect employment levels in the country, especially as India has a large informal economy, which is currently bearing the major brunt of the lockdown. In this context, targeted Active Labour Market Policies (ALMPs), which have been historically used to cushion the economic shock of such global crises in developing countries, can play an important role (Cazes, Heuer, & Verick, 2011; Imbert and Papp, 2015; World Bank, 2012).

A recent report from the Resolution Foundation suggests that youth unemployment could rise by 640,000 this year and the Association of Colleges is predicting around 100,000 leavers will find it difficult to gain work and work-based learning. So with these record unemployment levels amongst young people predicted, an important issue that is likely to emerge strongly for the careers profession from the COVID-19 pandemic is exactly how educational institutions can maximise the impact of their work with parents and carers to support the young people in their care with their career education and progression. This, of course, also has the potential to help young people continue to learn and develop whilst away from their schools for any reason, including any future periods of social isolation that might be necessary as a result of recurrent waves of infection.

A new report examining skill utilisation has been co-authored by Chris Warhurst with the OECD. It includes inputs from Peter Dickinson, also of IER. Focusing on the Leeds City Region in the UK, it reviews the different definitions and measures of skills use in workplaces. It shows why skill use matters for local development policies and outlines a set of measures for Leeds and other regions wanting to support better skill use.

The report can be found here.

While we may be in unprecedented times, a picture is already starting to emerge about the colossal impact that Covid-19 is having on labour markets, jobs and people.

The measures being implemented by countries to address the spread of Covid-19 are necessary as they will save lives but they are having a devastating impact on workers around the world. For example, in mid-March 2020, the International Labour Organisation (ILO) estimated that lockdown measures had already affected around 2.7 billion workers, representing around 81% of the world’s workforce. Moreover, the pandemic has intensified and expanded since the ILO’s initial estimates were published.