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>[Opening message posted on the unemployment
> -research list posted 15th July 1997]
>
>WELCOME TO THE LIST!!!
>I've started this list to provide a forum for discussion and
>exchange of information on unemployment problems. There
>seem to be many different groups and individuals with a
>strong interest in unemployment, but no obvious focus for discussion.
>Reports and papers are produced by individuals and groups,
>but there is no widely circulated journal with a interest in the area
>which might report the existence of these reports and papers.
>So a lot of people seem to be talking past each other.
>
>My particular interest is in the measurement of unemployment.
>I have a long standing interest in statistics, but was very
>disappointed at the report of the Royal Statistical Society
>on Unemployment Statistics made in 1995. A year or more
>onward and I've been made aware of many ways in which the
>LFS/ILO Unemployment Series as well as Count of Claimants
>fail to do justice to many groups who might be considered as
>unemployed. So why the cover up, I wonder? What does
>government gain by failing to recognise or measure
>the extent and size of Britain's labour reserves?
>
>The responses of the new Government so far have not got
>beyond the election pledges. Many people seem sceptical
>at the likely effectiveness of the measures taken to deal
>with long-term unemployment, but this seems to be a
>much smaller part of total unemployment than nearly
>everyone imagines. On the other side, steps taken to
>encourage single parents to enter employment
>seem to have nothing to do with existing measures of
>unemployment. But the steps taken do seem to label
>single parents as unused labour supply. If single parents
>so labelled become countable as unemployed, what of
>other parents not in employment??
>
>I don't expect answers to such questions. Just putting
>them forward to indicate the width of the field and the kinds
>of topics which discussions on the list could well cover.
>More in next message.
>
>Ray Thomas, Faculty of Social Sciences, Open University
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