Work

Work in progress

A decade of change in the world of work

Hannah Slaughter
Hannah Slaughter

This chapter examines how changes in the labour market over the past 10 years have affected attitudes to work, and what these attitudes might mean for three persistent woes in the British labour market: low productivity, low levels of job mobility and new business start-ups, and low levels of labour market participation among some groups.

This is a chapter from The National Centre for Social Research (NatCen)’s annual British Social Attitudes (BSA) survey.

Key findings

  • 74 per cent of workers say they are satisfied with their main job, down from 81 per cent in 2015.
  • The proportion willing to work harder than required to help their employer succeed has fallen from 69 per cent to 55 per cent.
  • Workers are less likely than 10 years ago to say they have an interesting job (63 per cent, down from 74 per cent) or to report opportunities for advancement (26 per cent, down from 35 per cent).
  • Those saying a high income is important to them personally in a job has risen from 67 per cent to 78 per cent. But only 23 per cent feel their job provides a high income, a gap of 55 points. The equivalent gap for advancement opportunities is 54 points. Both gaps have widened since 2015.
  • 61 per cent say it is important to them that someone can decide their own working hours in a job, up from 46 per cent. But just 31 per cent say they can do that in their current job.

Further reading

Work in progress
A decade of change in the world of work
·
Hannah Slaughter
Calculating the Real Living Wage for London and the rest of the UK 2026
·
Nye Cominetti, Louise Murphy, Cillian Sheehan
Revision of labour
Unpacking the ONS’s new estimates for productivity and hours worked
·
Hannah Slaughter, Simon Pittaway
Hannah Slaughter
Hannah Slaughter Principal Economist