Last week, a bit of good news for chancellor Jeremy Hunt came in the form of the latest Office for National Statistics (ONS) employment data, which showed a decrease in the number of economically inactive people in the three months to December 2022. For a government that has made it its business to nudge people back into work after the Covid-19 pandemic led to a sharp rise in economic inactivity, this is encouraging.
But it was 16-to-24-year-olds who led the back-to-work rush – there are still about 318,000 more people in the 50-to-64 cohort who are inactive compared with pre-pandemic levels. This figure has slightly increased over the past three ONS surveys on the subject between August and December 2022.
Despite Hunt’s recent pledge to look at ways to make work “worth your while”, it may not be easy to tempt the older age bracket back into employment – especially skilled workers who have the financial resources to withstand the cost of living crisis without abandoning retirement, such as NHS doctors.