Unemployment figures will continue to rise after today’s shock increase, experts have told the Huffington Post UK.
The figures, released on Wednesday morning, paint a bleak picture of the UK economy with levels of women out of work at a two-decade high and one in five young people are unemployed.
Chief economist at the thinktank IPPR Tony Dolphin said: “The redundancies are only just starting to kick in. It’s going to get worse. Some cuts are going to kick in for colleges and schools in August, we’re not going to really see them until the next figures. Things like colleges and schools you will get a seasonal pattern to it.”
The 38,000 increase in unemployment between April and June 2011 is down to natural wastage and “reduced opportunities” in the public sector, Dolphin says.
Chancellor George Osborne said the figures were not “unexpected” as he launched a new economic initiative to help boost jobs.
"We are creating jobs in this economy as well as jobs being lost and policies like the enterprise zones which the government are announcing today ... are going to make a real difference, I hope," he told the BBC.
Dolphin also said there was room for optimism in the future.
“We probably are in for a tough few years. There’s hope there. The gloomy side is there’s not much room for policy makers to help things along.
But Ian Brinkley, centre director at The Work Foundation, Commenting on the statistics said the job market had come to a “shuddering halt”, despite politicians’ reassurances.
“With few signs that the recovery will significantly gather pace over the next six months, the prospects must be for higher unemployment by the end of the year.”
There are also serious concerns about the levels of unemployed women and young people. The levels of women out of work is at a 22 year high – the number of unemployed women increased by 21,000 to 1.05m.
The higher levels of women out of work are because more public sector jobs have been lost, rather than in the private sector: “ During the recession in 2009 it was men. What we’re seeing now is redundancies in the public sector, dominated by women", Dolphin says.
Chris Goulden,programme manager at the Joseph Rowntree Foundation warned it was “just the beginning” of a wave of public sector redundancies. Goulden says the growth in private sector jobs is a “silver lining” but for many seeking jobs now, it would be difficult.
“The evidence says that any period of unemployment does have a scarring effect on your later earnings.
“The figures support the fact that the private sector is growing. But apart from that, inflation is up and earnings are flatlining. Everything is kind of the opposite of the way you want it to be. I’m not sure how long the country can cope with an economy like that.
“Out in the real world, away from the statistics it will be getting worse for students, not just those finishing degrees but any of them finishing education.”
“There’s more people chasing the same jobs and there’s already not enough jobs for the people seeking them. It will increase competition and if lone parents have been out of the job market for a while, and disabled people who have been moved off incapacity benefit, they’ll be competing with public sector workers with more skills.”