current gaps in income and earnings statistics: the self-employed conor d’arcy july 2015...
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![Page 1: Current gaps in income and earnings statistics: The self-employed Conor D’Arcy July 2015 @conortdarcy / @resfoundation](https://reader030.vdocuments.us/reader030/viewer/2022032414/56649ef25503460f94c04892/html5/thumbnails/1.jpg)
Current gaps in income and earnings statistics:
The self-employed
Conor D’Arcy
July 2015
@conortdarcy / @resfoundation
![Page 2: Current gaps in income and earnings statistics: The self-employed Conor D’Arcy July 2015 @conortdarcy / @resfoundation](https://reader030.vdocuments.us/reader030/viewer/2022032414/56649ef25503460f94c04892/html5/thumbnails/2.jpg)
Two notable trends during the downturn and recovery – (i) weak earnings growth
![Page 3: Current gaps in income and earnings statistics: The self-employed Conor D’Arcy July 2015 @conortdarcy / @resfoundation](https://reader030.vdocuments.us/reader030/viewer/2022032414/56649ef25503460f94c04892/html5/thumbnails/3.jpg)
Two notable trends during the downturn and recovery – (ii) strong employment growth
![Page 4: Current gaps in income and earnings statistics: The self-employed Conor D’Arcy July 2015 @conortdarcy / @resfoundation](https://reader030.vdocuments.us/reader030/viewer/2022032414/56649ef25503460f94c04892/html5/thumbnails/4.jpg)
• For HMT – to what extent will growth feed through to the pockets of workers? How tax-rich is the recovery?
• For the Bank of England – what is the level of inflationary pressure in the labour market?
• Politically – has the corner been turned? And for whom?
A problem of central importance to our understanding of the recovery
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From the crisis up to 2011-12 the self-employed experienced an earnings decline of up to 24%, compared to up to 9% for employees
The data we do have on self-employed earnings suggests they have fallen even further
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From this we estimate what the earnings of ‘all workers’ would look like on our most timely earnings measure
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And our speculative projections for the most recent years suggest this gap has not been closed
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An improved measure of earnings that captures all workers, not just employees, to function alongside existing measures
What do we want?
When do we want it?
Well, depends...
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Options for consideration
Description Source
1 Adjust existing data on wages and salaries among employees using existing household surveys
Labour Force Survey (with new self-employed earnings questions) or Family Resources Survey (as in our provocation)
2 Expand coverage of the Labour Force Survey to capture the earnings of all workers
Labour Force Survey (with new self-employed earnings questions)
3 Adjust existing data on wages and salaries among employees using HMRC data
HMRC administrative data
4 Expand the scope of the Bank of England’s survey
BoE NMG consulting survey
5 Adjust existing data on wages and salaries among employees using a new survey of self-employed earnings
New survey
![Page 10: Current gaps in income and earnings statistics: The self-employed Conor D’Arcy July 2015 @conortdarcy / @resfoundation](https://reader030.vdocuments.us/reader030/viewer/2022032414/56649ef25503460f94c04892/html5/thumbnails/10.jpg)
• A necessarily complex endeavour: both in defining and measuring
• The bigger picture: we need the best and most timely suite of tools possible for understanding earnings, incomes and living standards
• In the meantime: we will continue to publish our ‘best guess’
Summary
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Current gaps in income and earnings statistics:
The self-employed
Conor D’Arcy, Resolution Foundation2 July 2015