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The Cost of High Unemployment
Author(s) -
Fraser Neil,
Sinfield Adrian
Publication year - 1985
Publication title -
social policy and administration
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.972
H-Index - 63
eISSN - 1467-9515
pISSN - 0144-5596
DOI - 10.1111/j.1467-9515.1985.tb00223.x
Subject(s) - treasury , publication , unemployment , section (typography) , activity based costing , value (mathematics) , economics , actuarial science , politics , subject (documents) , pension , public economics , accounting , political science , finance , business , macroeconomics , law , computer science , advertising , library science , machine learning
In response to R. A. B. Leaper's challenge in the last issue of this journal we present a report which we have just prepared for the BBC North‐East. We believe that a better understanding of the costs of high unemployment to the country is needed to inform decisions on how much we can afford to pay to tackle the problem. In the final section of the paper we show how this evidence can be of value in costing policy options. The last detailed costings of unemployment were published in 1982 for the financial year 1981/82. In February 1982 it appears that a political decision was taken not to publish the latest Treasury estimate updating their 1981 calculations. Since then numerous parliamentary questions on the subject have received very limited answers disputing the validity of the whole exercise.