Total earnings (including bonuses) growth also slowed to 4.2%, down from 4.6% in September to November 2025. Basic pay (excluding bonuses) rose by 4.2% in the October-December quarter, down from 4.4% a month ago. That’s up from 5.1% in September-November, and the highest rate since the first quarter of 2021. Below the surface, there are indications that younger workers in particular are being priced out of the market. “To Get Britain Working, Ministers must prioritise a twin focus on rapidly expanding tailored employment support and ensuring those returning to work are able to access secure, and well-paid jobs across the country.” The Government clearly recognises the need to provide more support to help people back into work but many initiatives – such as jobs on wheels and youth guarantees – remain in pilot phases.
Month Moving Average of Unweighted Median Hourly Wage Growth for the South Atlantic Census Division
“The FTSE 100 edged higher to close in on last week’s record, as the pound weakened following the release of UK wages and Jobs data that puts a March rate cut firmly on the table, barring any surprises in tomorrow’s inflation report. On a day when UK labour market data are weaker than expected, including on wages, notice how UK bond yields are falling by more than elsewhere. Today’s unemployment figures are “really concerning, particularly for younger people,” warns Mark Rowland, chief executive of the Mental Health Foundation. I plot below CPI inflation together with my estimate of the unemployment rate gap (unemployment less “equilibrium” or trend unemployment). Before we (economists) jump into conclusions about a Bank Rate cut next month, we should consider the latest unemployment rise to 5.2% in a historical context. “Private sector wage growth continues to slow and is at its lowest rate in five years.
Month Moving Average of Weighted Median Hourly Wage Growth: Overall (FRBATLWGT3MMAWMHWGO)
We know that a sizeable number of young people out of work are struggling with their mental health, and that many people find their mental health is a blocker to finding and staying in quality employment. Today’s labour market data shows that annual real regular pay (ex-bonuses) rose by just 0.8% in October to December 2025 – that’s using the Consumer Prices Index measure of inflation. With a further inflation-plus rise in the minimum wage for year olds scheduled for April, young workers will continue to struggle to gain a foothold in the labour market in the near-term.” The fall in headline pay was partly driven by an easing in public sector wage settlements, which fell for the first time since July 2025.
This tool tracks the relative changes in home ownership affordability at a higher frequency and more granular level of geography than other current housing tools. The data are constructed using U.S Bureau of Labor Statistics microdata and updated quarterly. Users can explore “what if” questions about labor market variables and GDP. Bureau of Labor Statistics, which typically occurs on the first Friday of each month. We will update the First Look’s data with each release of the Employment Situation Summary from the U.S.
The Jobs Calculator calculates the net employment change needed to achieve a target unemployment rate after a specified number of months. Median of the year-over-year percent change in hourly wage rates computed at the individual level using linked wage records.For more details about this release from the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta, visit their Wage Growth Tracker webpage. Chart 2 shows the percentage of zero wage changes in our data (specifically the percent of individual wage growth falling in the range of +0.5 percent and -0.5 percent).
We urge Government to ensure that these young people – the ones facing the greatest barriers to work – have access to the greatest support.” Poor quality work that is low paid, unpredictable, or in hostile environments can drastically worsen people’s mental health. This means being paid enough to afford the essentials, having flexibility, and giving young people the tools and confidence to know that work can be positive force on their mental health and part of a fulfilling life.
- This ensures a smooth integration with your current workflows while enhancing their effectiveness.
- The system intelligently routes sensitive matters to human HR team members when required, and all conversations are monitored with real-time observability features.
- Reported as a 3-month moving average.
- Sterling has fallen by two-thirds of a cent against the US dollar, to $1.355, its lowest rate since 6 February.
- The cost to borrow on a UK credit card has hit its highest level in at least 20 years, data provider MoneyFacts reports.
- Getting it right when it comes to People questions and issues is essential — the alternative affects people’s lives because HR is high-stakes.
Wage Growth Tracker 4.3 Percent
“We need a mobilisation on the scale of the COVID response to tackle this crisis and get young people’s lives back on track before we see an entire generation lost to long-term unemployment.” Wider problems in the job market are likely to make this worse with millions of school leavers and new graduates scheduled to enter the labour market in the coming months.” The chances increased after the Office for National Statistics reported that the UK unemployment rate rose to 5.2% in the final quarter of 2025. This tool provides data and analysis on the changing labor force participation rate from the perspective of reasons given for not participating in the labor market. The Labor Market Distributions Spider Chart is designed to allow monitoring of broad labor market developments by comparing current conditions to those in up to two earlier time periods that the user selects.
Please review the copyright information in the series notes before sharing. Stay connected with our monthly newsletter. This is lower than the long term average of 3.81%.
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HMRC data shows there were 1,744 registered company insolvencies in England and Wales last month, up from 1,683 in December. Increasing this payment to £100 per month would clear the debt in six months, and halve the interest charged (£42). Luckily, there are some lengthy interest-free balance transfer cards to choose from, with TSB leading the market with a 38-month term, which charges a transfer fee of 3.49%. That has pushed down growth in real wages (ie, earnings after CPIH inflation) to just 0.5% in the final quarter of 2025, down from 2.4% in October-December 2024). Green Party leader Zack Polanski is calling for a ‘Covid-style mobilisation’ to tackle the UK’s youth unemployment crisis.
- A fall in the value of sterling typically boosts the share prices of multinational companies listed in London, as it makes their overseas earnings more valuable.
- A new project introduces online datasets on the Chinese macroeconomy coauthored by Atlanta Fed researchers.
- Track initial and continued claims for unemployment insurance—and claimant demographics—for each state and nationally with the Atlanta Fed’s Unemployment Claims Monitor.
- Investors now fully expect two rate cuts by Christmas, which would bring Bank Rate down to 3.25%.
- Once we have constructed the individual hourly earnings data, we match the hourly earnings of individuals observed in both the current month and 12 months earlier.
- Green Party leader Zack Polanski is calling for a ‘Covid-style mobilisation’ to tackle the UK’s youth unemployment crisis.
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Surveyed households are in the CPS sample four consecutive months, not interviewed for next eight months, and then in the survey again four consecutive months. The data we use to compute the Atlanta Fed’s Wage Growth Tracker are from the monthly Current Population Survey (CPS), administered by the U.S. The interactive chart https://arahindonesia.com/2022/05/cost-variance-what-it-is-formula-example/ displays the Wage Growth Tracker along with versions of the tracker for select work and demographic characteristics (shown as either 3-month or 12-month moving averages). The three-month moving average calculations for November 2025 include August 2025, September 2025, and November 2025. The smaller sample size implies that the confidence interval for the point estimates for both months is wider than it had been. Our platform complies with industry security standards and integrates seamlessly with your existing security infrastructure to maintain data privacy and confidentiality.
At the end of last year almost one-in-six young people who wanted to work couldn’t find a job. To get a higher rate than 14%, you need to go back to April-June 2015 when it was 14.2%. The 14% jobless rate recorded in October-December 2025 among the UK’s year olds was last seen in July-September 2020, when Covid-19 lockdowns hit demand for workers. Shifting debts around is handy to grab interest-free offers, but the debt will hang overhead if only the minimum repayments are made each month. The cost to borrow on a UK credit card has hit its highest level in at least 20 years, data provider MoneyFacts reports. “Sadly, younger workers and entrylevel roles are bearing the brunt of this slowdown, with employment among under-35s down sharply since mid2024.
Growth in the median wage represents the experience of a worker whose wage is in the middle of the wage distribution in the current month, relative to a worker in the middle of the wage distribution 12 months earlier. The earnings data are for wage and salary earners, and refer to an individual’s main job (earnings data are not collected for self-employed people). This follows many months of complaints from businesses that chancellor Rachel Reeves has pushed up employment costs, through increases in national insurance contributions and the minimum wage.
“Today’s figures show there are 381,000 more people in wage growth tracker work since the start of 2025, but we know there is more to do to get people into jobs. That’s because yields on 10-year gilts have fallen 25 basis points over that time. That’s a one-month low, eliminating the rise in borrowing costs during the political furore over Keir Starmer’s future earlier this month.
The exact timing depends on when the Bureau of the Census publishes the micro data from the CPS. The Wage Growth Tracker is updated once the Atlanta Fed’s CPS dataset is constructed. For more information on this and its relation to models of nominal wage rigidity, see the work by our colleagues at the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco (Daly, Hobijn, and Wiles 2012 and Daly and Hobijn 2014). Notice that the proportion of zero wage changes increased during both of the last two recessions.
Economic indicators were beginning to shine some positivity but that has arguably been wiped by this latest data. The MPC will be reassured by further evidence of pay pressures easing, and the labour market continuing to soften. Hospitality payrolled employment may be down almost 3% since the start of 2025, but it is still 2% higher than pre-Covid levels.
A new dataset of quarterly expenditure-based gross domestic product (GDP-exp) data and its major components. A new project introduces online datasets on https://tpgacela.com/difference-between-real-and-nominal-accounts/ the Chinese macroeconomy coauthored by Atlanta Fed researchers. China is the world’s second-largest economy, but it can be difficult for economists to access certain data. This is lower than the long term average of 3.93%. All data are subject to revision.
“An unprecedented series of monthly unemployment increases is the hallmark of this Labour Government. Unemployment in the UK has risen to 5.2%, the highest level in nearly five years, while wage growth continues to slow, raising the prospect of another cut to interest rates in the spring. MoneyFacts data shows that the the average credit card purchase APR annual percentage rate hit 35.8% in February, the highest rate since records began in June 2006.
For reference, also plotted is the median individual wage growth. The mean wage growth uniformly lies above the median because the distribution of individual wage growth is asymmetric. The mean wage growth measure displays more variability over time than does the median. We then compute the median of the distribution of individual 12-month wage changes for each month. The matching algorithm results in about 2,000 individual wage growth observations per month. We use the information in these two interviews, spaced 12 months apart, to compute our wage growth statistic.
Your data is stored securely and is only accessible to your company. Your team has complete supervision over Harper’s activity, giving you real-time insight into HR interactions. Saved per HR teammate per month on policy administration alone by automating policy compliance tasks with Harper. Harper answers 94% of SHRM-CP exam questions correctly, which is points better than the passing rate, and answers them 12x as fast. This sophisticated approach ensures that routine matters are handled autonomously while sensitive or complex cases receive the right level of human attention, enabling HR teams to operate more strategically and efficiently. Wisq’s guardrails are deeply integrated with your organization’s specific HR frameworks and compliance requirements.