UK unemployment: What you need to know

The number of people in work in the UK has finally returned to pre-recession levels. But is everything as rosy as it seems?

As this map shows, the growth in jobs has regional variations, despite the proportion of people being in work standing at 73 per cent for the first time since 2008.

Overall, seven of the 12 regions are still worse off than before the crash.

In addition, this growth in jobs does not amount to growth in wages, as according to the TUC workers are still in the midst of the longest, deepest decline in real earnings since as far back as the 1860s - wages falling eight per cent since 2007.

The headline rate of 73 per cent also masks the rise in part-time work, with those who could not, or did not want to, find a full-time job rising from 9.4 per cent of the workforce to 16.5 per cent.

The TUC said that 77 per cent of job-creation since 2010 has been within sectors where the average wage is under £7.95 an hour, including retail, waitressing and residential care.

The number of self-employed people is also up to 4.5 million, an increase of around 700,000.

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