UK: no Brexit effect on job market

The unemployment rate remains substantially stable in July in UK, even after Brexit, that has not slowed the pace of creation of jobs, according to the data published by the Office for National Statistics (ONS).

In July the number of people who applied for unemployment benefit in Britain rose to 2,400 units, compared to 3,600 the previous month. The figure is worse than expected by analysts which estimated an increase of 1,800 units.

The unemployment rate remained stuck at 4.9% in the three months to July as expected by analysts. This is the lowest level since August – October 2005. Between May and July, the total number of unemployed was equal to 1.63 million units (down 39 thousand on the previous quarter and -190 thousand compared to the same quarter of 2015).

In the same period the number of employed people stood at 31.77 million units, rising to 174,000 units over the quarter and 559,000 units on year. However, average earnings, excluding bonuses, rose by just 2.1% in the three months to July,compared with 2.3% a month ago and growth slowed down from 2.5% to 2.3% when including bonuses.

Ben Brettell, senior economist at Hargreaves Lansdown, said: "The UK's labour market proved resilient in the immediate aftermath of the vote to leave the EU, ONS data has shown".