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Press Statement

Preasráiteas

07 September 2020

Live Register for August 2020 and COVID-19 Income Support Payment Measures

  • The COVID-19 crisis has continued to have a significant impact on the labour market during August 2020
  • Unadjusted Live Register total stands at 225,844 for August 2020
  • Seasonally adjusted Live Register total for August 2020 was 213,700, down 12,400 from July 2020
  • In the last week of August 2020, 224,956 persons were in receipt of the Pandemic Unemployment Payment
  • In August 2020, 359,095 persons benefited from the Temporary Wage Subsidy Scheme
  • Of the 224,956 persons in receipt of the Pandemic Unemployment Payment for the week ending 30 August 2020, 52.3% are male, 72.1% are Irish and almost a quarter are in each of the 25-34 year old (22.6%) and 35-44 year old (22.3%) age groups.

Go to release: Live Register August 2020

 

The Central Statistics Office (CSO) has today (07 September 2020) issued results from the Live Register in respect of August 2020. Today’s release also includes details regarding the COVID-19 income support schemes.

Catalina Gonzalez, CSO Statistician, explains the approach taken regarding the publication of today’s Live Register and COVID-19 income supports:

In the last week of August 2020, 224,956 of those whose income from employment has been affected due to COVID-19 benefitted from the Pandemic Unemployment Payment (PUP) which is administered by the Department of Employment Affairs and Social Protection (DEASP). A larger cohort were facilitated through the Revenue Temporary Wage Subsidy Scheme (TWSS) in August 2020 (359,095).

These income support payments are not captured in the traditional methodology of the Live Register which is a historical series that includes the number of claimants for Jobseekers Benefit and Jobseekers Assistance (see Information Note on Implications of COVID-19 on the Live Register and the Monthly Unemployment Estimates for more details).

A review of non-recipient Live Register claims is ongoing at the DEASP and relates primarily to cases where a person who received a PUP has since closed their PUP claim and reported a return to employment. This will impact the Live Register totals, as some of these non-recipient jobseeker claims were included on the Live Register, but their jobseeker claims were not automatically closed at that time (see the Technical note published by the CSO today for more information including an analysis of recipient and non-recipient claims)The CSO has decided to compile the Live Register data for August 2020 in the traditional way and provide details of COVID-19 income support payments (see the Detailed COVID-19 Income Support and Live Register Tables) and analysis of the Live Register recipient and non-recipient claims (see the Technical Note) separately.

The CSO will continue to evaluate the available income support schemes and the results of the recipient and non-recipient analysis to determine whether any changes are required to the methodology for the Live Register to improve the usability of the series. Any changes the CSO may make to the methodology in the future will be clearly outlined to users in the statistical release and accompanying material.’

Commenting on today’s publication, Catalina Gonzalez continued:

The unadjusted Live Register total for August 2020 is 225,844. When seasonal effects are considered, the seasonally adjusted Live Register total for August 2020 was 213,700 which was a decrease of 12,400 from July 2020.

Outside of the traditional Live Register, in the last week of August 2020, 224,956 people were in receipt of the PUP while 359,095 persons benefitted from the TWSS in August 2020.

A total of 783,485 persons were on the Live Register in August 2020, received the PUP in the last week of August 2020 or benefitted from the TWSS in August 2020. This number is not the total of the three schemes, as there is some overlap between them due to the different frequency of the payments, and the fact that some people who are included on the Live Register but not receiving a payment, might be in receipt of either the PUP or the TWSS.’

Commenting further on aggregates of the COVID-19 income supports, Catalina Gonzalez continued:

‘The CSO is working with and will continue to collaborate with both DEASP and the Revenue Commissioners to meet user needs for availability of detailed aggregates for the COVID-19 income supports.

Tables providing the breakdowns of the numbers receiving the PUP and the TWSS each week by sex, age group, county and nationality grouping are being made available today (See Detailed COVID-19 Income Support and Live Register Tables).

Looking at this data it can be seen that of the 224,956 persons in receipt of the PUP for the week ending 30 August 2020, 52.3% are male, 72.1% are Irish, and almost a quarter are in each of the 25-34 year old (22.6%) and 35-44 year old (22.3%) age groups. It can also be noted that 709,138 people have received at least one payment since the scheme was established in March 2020, of which 56.4% are male and 48.1% are aged between 25 and 44 years of age.

For those benefitting from the TWSS, out of the 257,435 currently recorded as being on the scheme and having received a payment for the week ending 23 August 2020, 53.8% are male, 75.5% are Irish Nationals and 47.8% are aged between 25 and 44 years.

Enquiries:

Catalina Gonzalez, Labour Market Analysis -  087-646 7535

Email: labour@cso.ie

For further details:

Information Note on Implications of COVID-19 on the Live Register and the Monthly Unemployment Estimates

List of CSO Statistical Releases Affected by COVID-19

For further information contact:

Catalina Gonzalez (+353) 21 453 5163

or email labour@cso.ie

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