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Autumn Statement 2013: Top 5 Graphs You Need To See

5 Autumn Statement Graphs You Need To See
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Business reporter, Huffington Post UK

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Britain's Chancellor of the Exchequer George Osborne holds his Autumn Statement document as he leaves the Treasury in London on December 5, 2013 bound for parliament to deliver his budget update. Britain ramped up its economic growth forecasts as the recovery gathers pace, finance minister George Osborne said in a key budget update. AFP PHOTO / POOL / ALASTAIR GRANT (Photo credit should read ALASTAIR GRANT/AFP/Getty Images)
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George Osborne's Autumn Statement, at 122 pages long, may not be the most riveting read.

Few people who aren't academic wonks or Westminster types would dive into the document, especially with its piles of supporting documents, policy costings and tables.

Here we've taken the best Autumn Statement graphs to show you what you need to know.

Autumn Statement 2013 In Graphs
Upgraded forecasts can still be wrong....(01 of05)
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Even though the OBR upped its forecasts for the next few years, the government's forecaster has been disastrously wrong in the past.Writing on the Huffington Post UK, IPPR senior economist Tony Dolphin said: "At the time of the June 2010 Budget, the Office for Budget Responsibility (OBR) forecast that the economy would grow by 8.2% between 2010 and 2013; the likely outturn, based on the forecasts it published today, is just 2.7% - one-third the expected rate.To illustrate how haphazard economic forecasting can be, here is the OBR's "flamethrower of uncertainty" that charts GDP's potential path over the next few years. (credit:OBR)
Debt won't start going down until 2016 (02 of05)
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Osborne is taking his time to get to grips with the public finances... (credit:Treasury)
The recovery isn't over until 2018 (03 of05)
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As the Spectator's Coffee House blog points out, it'll be a long time until we have got back to where we were in 2008. (credit:Coffee House)
What squeezed middle? (04 of05)
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The Treasury's own charts shows the poorest two tenths (followed by the richest tenth) are the worst hit by benefit changes, while the middle classes are sitting pretty. (credit:Treasury )
Record number working but in what kind of jobs?(05 of05)
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There may be a record number of people in work (29.95 million) but are they the right kind of jobs? Nearly 1.5 million people, the highest on record, are in part-time jobs even though they want to work full time - in a rising problem of underemployment. And as this graph shows from IPPR, the North of England is suffering much more than the rest of England. (credit:IPPR )

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