A few charts - consumers and unemployment

A few charts to make you think -

Lots of headlines in the press today about the UK economy following the news yesterday that the Bank of England had upped its economic growth hopes.  Fair enough - but the average consumer is still not seeing real wage increases:

 

Still, the UK/US' lower unemployment does show the way for Europe.  What are they missing?  More temporary employment...

 

 



Of course for UK policy-making the question is whether the big fall in unemployment anticipated by the Bank of England is reflective of economic growth...and changing labour market statistical dynamics (like in the US with falling labour participation rates).  This is the flipside of the rise of temporary employment...it can muck up the numbers

 

Japanese consumers are also not contributing materially to GDP growth - and one of the reasons for the disappointing Japanese GDP numbers today.  Abeconomics needs to try harder = more stimulus