The number of people at work is currently at its highest level in the history of the state. Far from heralding the recession that was feared a year ago, even our halting recovery from the pandemic has led to the creation of 221,000 new jobs, leaving the number of people in the workforce almost 100,000 bigger.
In the third quarter of this year, there were almost 2.5 million people in work, and they were aged between 15 and 89 years, showing that age really is no barrier to endeavour. Unemployment figures remain marginally higher than before Covid, at 5.5 per cent compared to 4.7 per cent, despite the fact that sectors such as hospitality and construction are crying out for labour. Looks like those people