UK Unemployment Falls To Lowest Level In 5 Years

The unemployment rate just fell to a 5-year low of 6.6%.

Here's some stats from the UK's Office of National Statistics:

Comparing February to April 2014 with November 2013 to January 2014, there was a large increase in employment and a large fall in unemployment. There was a further fall in the number of economically inactive people aged from 16 to 64.

These changes continue the general direction of movement over the past two years. There were 30.54 million people in work, 345,000 more than for November 2013 to January 2014 and 780,000 more than a year earlier. 72.9% of people aged from 16 to 64 were in work, up from 72.3% for November 2013 to January 2014 and up from 71.5% a year earlier.

The latest figure of 72.9%, for February to April 2014, is 0.1 percentage point lower than before the downturn of 2008-09. There were 2.16 million unemployed people, 161,000 fewer than for November 2013 to January 2014 and 347,000 fewer than a year earlier.

The unemployment rate was 6.6% of the economically active population (those in work plus those seeking and available to work), down from 7.2% for November 2013 to January 2014 and down from 7.8% a year earlier.