UK emerging as self employment capital: survey

A report published today, describes the UK as the self-employment capital of western Europe, adding to concerns over the strength of the UK's economic recovery.

According to figures released by the Institute of Pubic Policy Research (IPPR), the growth in self-employment in the UK had been the fastest of all western European countries in the past year, a trend expected to continue when official labour market figures are published tomorrow.

The number of self-employed had increased by over 1.5 million in the past 13 years to 4.5 million and now comprised over 15 per cent of the labour force.

The report said, "The UK had internationally low levels of self-employment for many years but has caught up with the EU average and, if current growth continues, the UK will look more like southern and eastern European countries, which tend to have much larger shares of self-employed workers."

Around two-fifths of all new jobs since 2010 had been among the self-employed, a trend that had led to a debate over the strength of the recovery and helped shape Labour's cost-of-living agenda.

Labour had accused the government of over-selling the boom of the past 18 months after a series of reports that showed many recently self-employed people worked part-time and received a fraction of the wage enjoyed by full-time employees.

According to IPPR, self-employment had proven to be a key driver of overall job creation, with the working-age employment rate reaching historically high levels.

The analysis by IPPR showed that between the first quarters of 2013 and 2014, the number of self-employed workers increased by 8 per cent, faster than any other western European economy and outpaced by only a handful of countries in southern and eastern Europe.

Spencer Thompson, IPPR senior economic analyst, said, around 2,000 people a month were moving off into their own businesses.

He added, government's response to the rise in self-employment had been to praise the UK's entrepreneurial zeal, while increasingly promoting self-employment as an option to job-seekers.