The unemployment rate is one of the integral showings affecting the countries’ economies. Additionally, the COVID-19 pandemic hugely affected the state of long-term unemployment in the United Kingdom, as well as other countries around the world. Hence, during the coronavirus strike period, certain populations or groups of able-to-work people are more predisposed to staying in a non-job-possessing condition than others. Generally, several factors influence the individual’s ability in finding a job; therefore, long-term unemployed people can be united based on some criteria as well.
In the United Kingdom, unemployment rates and the contains of the unemployed populations abruptly changed during the pandemic in 2020-2021. According to the Office for National Statistics, in October 2021 the unemployment rate was estimated at 4.5%, and this showing is several times higher than before the pandemic (Employment in the UK, 2021). The organization states as well that long-term unemployment is not usually analyzed for individual geographies below the UK (Long-term unemployment West Midlands and 6 LEPs, 2021). To somehow stabilize the UK economy such models as FARIMA, ANN, or SVR models can be utilized to predict future unemployment rates and develop effective solutions (Katris, 2020). Hence, it allows to state that employment rates are quite high even in this case of lockdowns, however, certain groups lose their jobs and tend to remain without a stable job for a long period.
Long-term unemployment can be considered a subset of the total number of non-working people. This situation can be provoked by companies’ decisions to take on fewer workers due to the financial crash and based on the long-term perspective defined by COVID-19 (Mayhew & Anand, 2020). In addition, the least skilled workers including servants, shop consultants, promoters, cabbies are more likely to maintain the long-term unemployed status (Bell & Blenchflower, 2020). Hence, diverse events and courses for increasing qualifications should be provided to decrease economic imbalance, rise stability, and provide potential workers with appropriate working positions and job offers.
References
Bell, D. N. F., & Blanchflower, D. G. (2020). US and UK labour markets before and during the COVID-19 crash. National Institute Economic Review, 252, 52-69. Web.
Employment in the UK. (2021). Office for National Statistics. Web.
Katris, C. (2020). Prediction of unemployment rates with time series and machine learning techniques. Computational Economics, 55, 673-706. Web.
Long-term unemployment West Midlands and 6 LEPs. (2021). Office for National Statistics. Web.
Mayhew, K., & Anand, P. (2020). COVID-19 and the UK labour market. Oxford Review of Economic Policy, 36(1), 215-224. Web.