Labour Market Statistics for 16 to 24 year olds: Scotland and the United Kingdom - April 2023 to March 2024

Introduction

This publication contains the latest estimates of employment, unemployment and economic inactivity for 16 to 24 year olds. Estimates are for Scotland and the United Kingdom and cover the period April 2023 to March 2024. Data are sourced from the Annual Population Survey (APS); first released on 12 June 2024 by the Office for National Statistics (ONS).

An Official Statistics Publication for Scotland

These statistics are official statistics. Official statistics are statistics that are produced by crown bodies, those acting on behalf of crown bodies, or those specified in statutory orders, as defined in the Statistics and Registration Service Act 2007.

These statistics were reviewed, as part of a compliance check, against the Code of Practice in May 2021. This review found a range of positive features that demonstrate the trustworthiness, quality and value of this bulletin.

Since then a number of improvements have been made including:

• incorporating a key findings section
• presenting the figures as “estimates”
• including confidence intervals in the tables
• providing more detailed information on quality assurance carried out while preparing the publication

Additional estimates have also been included for employment levels and rates for people aged 16 to 24 in local authorities.

Scottish Government statistics are regulated by the Office for Statistics Regulation (OSR). OSR sets the standards of trustworthiness, quality and value in the Code of Practice for Statistics that all producers of official statistics should adhere to.

More information about Scottish Government statistics is available on the Scottish Government website.

About the Annual Population Survey

The APS combines results from the ONS Labour Force Survey (LFS) with the English, Welsh and Scottish LFS boosts. This provides a larger annual sample of households. Compared with the quarterly LFS, the annual data is statistically more robust. Estimates for local areas and smaller populations (including those aged 16 to 24 years) are more accurate as a result.

Compared to the APS, the LFS shows similar long-term labour market trends for 16 to 24 year olds in Scotland. The ONS publish LFS estimates for 16 to 24 year olds as Official Statistics in development if their monthly publication.

ONS have published an article which explains the reintroduction of the Labour Force Survey estimates and the impact of reweighting the key indicators for the UK.

Due to the ongoing challenges with response rates, ONS Labour Force Survey estimates will be badged as official statistics in development until further review. The ONS Annual Population Survey data will remain accredited official statistics. While the APS has not been as affected by the reduction in responses, there will be an impact and the APS does not reflect the most recent population  weighting that has been applied to the LFS. However, ONS are carrying out analysis to assess the impact of falling sample sizes on the quality of the APS estimates.

Compared to the APS, the LFS shows similar long-term labour market trends for 16 to 24 year olds in Scotland.

The population totals used for the latest APS estimates differ from the population totals used in the reweighted LFS estimates and use projected growth rates from Real Time Information data for UK, EU and non-EU populations based on 2021 patterns. The total population used for the APS therefore does not take into account any changes in migration, birth rates, death rates, and so on, since June 2021, so level estimates may be under- or over-estimating the true values and should be used with caution. Estimates of rates will, however, be robust.

Labour Market Transformation

The Office for National Statistics (ONS) are transforming the Labour Force Survey (LFS) to enable a more adaptive and responsive survey to meet user needs and maintain the quality of labour market statistics. They are publishing articles on the transformation. In April 2024 ONS published an article on the latest progress of the Labour Force Survey transformation.

ONS also welcome any feedback on this latest update and their plans. Please email them at labour.market.transformation@ons.gov.uk to tell them what you think.