There are 9.4 million unemployed people in Britain.
Around 1.44 million people in the UK meet the official definition of ‘unemployed’, meaning they are actively seeking work, and able to start working within two weeks. The 9.4 million figure refers to the number of people in the UK aged 16-64 who are economically inactive, which includes students, long-term sick and retirees.
A post on Meta social media platform Threads claiming “9.4 million Brits are unemployed” is missing important context.
The figure refers to the number of people in the UK aged 16 to 64 who are considered economically inactive, for reasons such as being retired, long-term sick or a student.
The Office for National Statistics publishes this figure for the whole of the UK (not just Great Britain) on a monthly basis.
This is a different category to those who match the official definition of being unemployed, which refers to people who are actively seeking work. The most recent figures show there were 1.44 million unemployed people in the UK in April to June 2024.
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The UK uses the international definition of unemployment, as outlined by the International Labour Organisation. This defines people as ‘unemployed’ if they do not have a job, have been looking for work within the past four weeks and would be available to start work in the next two weeks, as well as those who are out of work but have found a job and will be starting it within the next two weeks.
In April-June 2024, this definition covered around 1.44 million people.
The post appears to be referring instead to the number of people who are considered economically inactive, which was 9.4 million in April toJune 2024.
Someone is considered economically inactive if they’re between the ages of 16 and 64, are not in employment, have not been seeking work within the last four weeks and/or are unable to start work within the next two weeks.
They were classed as such for a variety of reasons. In April to June 2024, more than 2.5 million of these people were students, and over 2.8 million were long-term sick (alongside 230,000 who were temporarily sick). Over 1.7 million economically inactive people were looking after family/home, and just over a million were retired. There were also 27,000 “discouraged workers”, people who are not looking for work because they believe jobs aren’t available.
This article is part of our work fact checking potentially false pictures, videos and stories on Facebook. You can read more about this—and find out how to report Facebook content—here. For the purposes of that scheme, we’ve rated this claim as missing context because the post refers to the number of people in the UK who meet the official definition of economic inactivity, rather than being unemployed.
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