Reported in Insider today:
‘The Recruitment and Employment Confederation Report on Jobs for Scotland sound the number of people securing permanent posts has risen sharply Bottom of Form. . Top of Form
Bottom of Form
The number of people securing permanent jobs in Scotland rose sharply in January, according to new data. Figures from the research by IHS Markit, Report on Jobs for Scotland, showed an increase in the number of temporary staff finding [permanent] jobs, following a modest decline in December.’
https://www.insider.co.uk/news/favourable-market-jobseekers-scotland-new-11990517
I can’t find what ‘sharp’ means in precise terms but this seems to be yet more objective evidence of strength in the Scottish economy contrary to the wholly unreliable estimates used for GDP and GERS and much-loved by our Unionist media as they rejoice in any opportunity to talk down their own folk.
Here’s a reminder of how useless GDP and GERS are. Both are heavily based on estimates rather than actual measures because the latter are not available for Scotland on its own. See this on GERS:
25 of the 26 GERS income figures are estimates and not the real figures!
As for GDP, even the DAVOS elite have turned against it. See this from 2016:
‘Three leading economists and academics at Davos agree: GDP is a poor way of assessing the health of our economies and we urgently need to find a new measure. Speaking in different sessions, IMF head Christine Lagarde, Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz, and MIT professor Erik Brynjolfsson stressed that as the world changes, so too should the way we measure progress. A country’s GDP is an estimate of the total value of goods and services they produce. But even when the concept was first developed back in the late 1930s, the man behind it, Simon Kuznets, warned it was not a suitable measure of a country’s economic development: “He understood that GDP is not a welfare measure, it is not a measure of how well we are all doing. It counts the things that we’re buying and selling, but it’s quite possible for GDP to go in the opposite direction of welfare.”’
https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2016/01/gdp/
By contrast these are accurate and objective measures of the Scottish economy’s development and stability:
And another one: ‘Scotland Revealed as Top Place in UK to Launch New Business’
40% increase in number of new Scottish businesses mainly under SNP government
‘Fewer Scottish businesses failing in 2017’
Scottish businesses showing signs of greater health than those in the rest of the UK
Note in many of these reports, the role of the Scottish Government in supporting and promoting positive change in the Scottish economy.
Talking-up Scotland 
Hi John. As you say – this type of ‘real world’ evidence is worth a considerably higher weighting than the ( ever so slightly informed) guesswork that the Westminster/Whitehall elites present to us in the guise of GERS etc. (The statisticians do the best job they can in the circs – but they are being asked to spin without yarn whilst the London establishment ‘spin’ furiously and tell us ‘yarns’ about being ‘too wee, to poor….’.
Completely off topic so apologies. Noticed this in the press release re. the HMICS report into undercover policing:
HMICS publish Strategic Review of Undercover Policing in Scotland
07 February 2018
‘HMICS identified that there is no recognised mechanism for Police Scotland to be advised if undercover officers from England and Wales are deployed in Scotland and recommends a formal process be put in place for notification of cross border operations’.
This demonstrates the ‘real’ changes that the devo settlement (however slowly and painfully gained) are making in state superstructure (UK) operational matters. Where previously ‘Scotland’ would simply not have registered as a concept. Having the devo package (and Police Scotland etc emanating from it) allows the Scottish bodies to exercise a voice and issue ‘recommendations’ that the power establishment would prefer had never been uttered. The UK authorities can’t (completely) ignore this ‘official’ avenue that is now being accessed – and will have to make some kind of response (whereas, in the past the concerns simply wouldn’t have had a focus which allowed them to even be aired). This devo business is such blinking hard work for us all – even if it does deliver these small (yet significant) positive changes as we go. It would all be so much easier with the full panoply of powers that Indy brings – Please Scotland – let’s grab that opportunity sooner rather than later – lots of good work being done under devo – but so slowly and agonisingly – all that effort for such small gains – whereas the same effort expended with Indy offers truly transformative potential.
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The other side of the rising wages story was revealed in an interview with a ‘market analyst’ I heard this week. It relates to rising wages in general, across the world and not just in Scotland. As you might have noticed, there has been, and continues to be significant turbulence in stock markets across the world and the interviewer was asking, why this was happening since the indicators are that wages and jobs, particularly in the USA are rising in real terms for the first time in a long time. (Although the bouffant haired one’s ‘State of the Union Address’ was basically him saying ‘I did that, I did that, ….’ on a repeating loop, it is likely that given the lag between policy implementation and the emergence of results that the rise is die to Mr Obama’s policies)More jobs, more money, more spending, increased demand – one would think this is ‘A GOOD THING’ and, of course it is for the general population. But, not for the speculators! All this spending will lead to inflation and rising inflation will lead to rises in interest rates, i.e. to the rock bottom interest rates these speculators have to pay to central banks to borrow money which they then lend to us at much higher rates to further enrich them for having done nothing as rentiers do (if that is not a contradiction!) So, the rentier’s profits and dividends will fall and inflation will erode the debts we owe them for having done nothing. Thus, the stockmarkets fall – ‘undergo a correction’ – because the rapacious ones will get a slightly less capacious amount, while the rest of us enjoy a little bit more.
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