The University of Strathclyde
The fear of a sharp rise in unemployment is a real one in this economic crisis. Last week’s latest Quarterly Economic Indicator from the Scottish Chambers of Commerce provided an insight into the harsh reality for many businesses in Scotland just now. In recent days, we’ve had a number of …
The closure of schools and childcare facilities have meant most parents currently have their children at home. Given the expectation that children won’t return to full time education for some time yet, this raises big questions over the quality of their education and the ability of their parents to juggle …
What Coronavirus means for education, childcare and working parents Read More »
Attention is now turning to how to start to ease restrictions on lockdown to enable the reopening of more parts of our economy. As we have pointed out in a previous article, the economy can’t simply be turned off and on again and any restarting must not jeopardise public health. …
Returning to work – the unintended consequences of easing the lockdown Read More »
We have recently started a new year-long project to examine how patterns of weekly hours worked have been changing in recent decades, examine what factors help explain those trends, and to consider implications for poverty, inequality – and policy. Whilst the distribution of hourly pay receives a lot of attention …
Changes in working hours, causes and implications – an introduction to our new project Read More »
Helen Martin, Assistant General Secretary of the Scottish Trade Union Congress (STUC), joins Mairi Spowage and Emma Congreve to discuss the impact of the coronavirus pandemic and associated lockdown on workers. Helen discusses how prepared we were for this pandemic, the policy measures that have been introduced to help workers, …
This article was written by Stephen Boyle, a visiting researcher at the Fraser of Allander Institute. Scotland’s universities have been successful in attracting international students. Among the richest ‘western’ countries, only in Luxembourg is the share of such students greater than in Scotland. In 2018-19, 23% of enrolments in Scotland’s …
One of the sectors currently most affected by the Coronavirus response has been tourism and hospitality. This sector was an early casualty of social distancing guidance, and in all likelihood, will be one of the last to go back to anything like normal. Quite how this sector will look in …
Today we’ve received new labour market statistics from the ONS. It is important to note at the outset that these relate to the period before the UK economy went in to lockdown. This means that the data today tell us little, if anything, about how the economy is doing right …
New labour market data and other economic indicators… Read More »
Professor Tricia Findlay, Director of the Scottish Centre for Employment Research (SCER) and Co-Chair of Scotland’s Fair Work Convention speaks about fair work and workplace practices in the context of the current pandemic. This includes discussion around new challenges in the workplace, furloughing, and how our relationship with working may …
Fair work and workplace practice in the current crisis Read More »
Data released yesterday on household incomes confirms what we’ve known for a while – the 2010s was a decade of chronic income stagnation. Median weekly disposable household income in Scotland in 2018/19 was £514 – identical to the figure for the UK. But income growth since 2009/10 has averaged just …
Five decades of household income growth… and what might be in store for the 2020s Read More »