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CIPD - Poles drift further apart as pay growth hits record low level and employment rate reaches nine and a half year high

Commenting on the Labour Market Statistics for March to May 2014 released recently by the Office for National Statistics (ONS), Mark Beatson, chief economist at the CIPD, comments:

“This latest set of statistics highlight a continuation of the recent pattern of strong employment growth, especially for young people, and very low pay growth.  However, with the growth in employment driven by self-employed people, especially among the part-time self-employed, this period might herald a modest slowdown in hiring activity compared with the recent past.

“The latest wage growth figures could be an unusually low one-off but, even if they are, they remind us that there are no signs of pay pressures building up in the official figures. This should not come as a surprise when labour productivity growth is flat and when the government’s welfare reforms, the availability of EU migrants and the latent supply from the under-employed mean we have strong growth in labour supply.  It is very difficult to see therefore where the pick-up in wages growth will come from.”

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