What are the causes of worklessness?

The Observatory’s economic inclusion team recently posted on this site to ask for any information on the causes and dynamics of worklessness for a literature review. The completed literature review is now available.

Key findings from the review are that:

• several groups of people are at high risk of worklessness – these include people in poor health, lone parents, some minority ethnic groups, social tenants, carers, and ex-offenders.
• disability/poor health and low qualifications are 2 of the most common barriers to employment
• many other barriers to employment were identified including a lack of work experience, low confidence, caring responsibilities, employer attitudes, poor public transport and the structure of the benefits system
• several factors influence a person’s decision to re-enter employment but the longer someone has been out of work, the less likely they are to return.

Many of these issues are explored further in the recently published Baseline Report on Economic Inclusion.

Thanks to all those who contribruted to this review by signposting relevant sources of information.

Related post: What is ‘worklessness’?

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