Wages for regular pay in the United Kingdom grew by approximately 5.2 percent in April 2025, although when adjusted for inflation, wages for regular pay only grew in real terms by 1.4 percent. Twenty months of inflation outpacing wages Between November 2021 and June 2023 inflation was higher than wage growth in the UK, resulting in falling real terms earnings throughout this 20-month period. While UK inflation peaked at 11.1 percent in October 2022, it was not until April 2023 that it fell below double figures, and not until May 2024 that it reached the Bank of England's target of two percent. Forecasts from the Autumn 2024 budget predict that the annual UK inflation will for 2024 will be 2.5 percent, down from 7.3 percent in 2023 and 9.1 percent in 2022. Due to high inflation, the UK's minimum wage also rose quite significantly during this period, with the "main" rate increasing from 8.91 pounds per hour in 2021 to 12.21 pounds per hour in 2025. Average earnings and gender pay gap For full-time workers in the United Kingdom, the median average annual earnings was 37,430 British pounds in 2024, compared with 34,663 pounds in 2023. In London, average earnings were significantly higher than the rest of the country, at 47,455 pounds. Just two other areas of the United Kingdom, the South East and Scotland, had annual salaries above the UK average. North East England had the lowest average salary, at 32,960 pounds. As of 2024, the gender pay gap for median gross hourly earnings in the UK was 13.1 percent for all workers, falling to seven percent for full-time workers and -3 percent for part-time workers. Compared with 1997, when the gender pay gap was 27.5 percent for all workers, there has been a degree of progress, although, at current trends, it will be some time before the gap is closed entirely.
In the three months to April 2025, average weekly earnings in the United Kingdom grew by 5.2 percent, while pay including bonuses grew by 5.3 percent, when compared with the same period leading to April 2024. In the same month, the inflation rate for the Consumer Price Index was 3.5 percent, indicating that wages were rising faster than prices that month. Average salaries in the UK In 2024, the average salary for full-time workers in the UK was 37,430 British pounds a year, up from 34,963 in the previous year. In London, the average annual salary was far higher than the rest of the country, at 47,455 pounds per year, compared with just 32,960 in North East England. There also still exists a noticeable gender pay gap in the UK, which was seven percent for full-time workers in 2024, down from 7.5 percent in 2023. Lastly, the monthly earnings of the top one percent in the UK was 15,887 pounds as of November 2024, far higher than even that of the average for the top five percent, who earned 7,641 pounds per month, while pay for the lowest 10 percent of earners was just 805 pounds per month. Waves of industrial action in the UK One of the main consequences of high inflation and low wage growth throughout 2022 and 2023 was an increase in industrial action in the UK. In December 2022, for example, there were approximately 830,000 working days lost due to labor disputes. Throughout this month, workers across various industry sectors were involved in industrial disputes, such as nurses, train drivers, and driving instructors. Many of the workers who took part in strikes were part of the UK's public sector, which saw far weaker wage growth than that of the private sector throughout 2022. Widespread industrial action continued into 2023, with approximately 303,000 workers involved in industrial disputes in March 2023. There was far less industrial action by 2024, however, due to settlements in many of the disputes, although some are ongoing as of 2025.
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Average weekly earnings for the whole economy, for total and regular pay, in real terms (adjusted for consumer price inflation), UK, monthly, seasonally adjusted.
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Real Earnings Excluding Bonuses in the United Kingdom decreased to 0.80 percent in April from 1.50 percent in March of 2025. This dataset includes a chart with historical data for the United Kingdom Real Average Weekly Earnings Excluding Bonuses.
The median annual earnings for full-time employees in the United Kingdom was approximately 37,430 British pounds in 2024, compared with 34,963 pounds in the previous year. At the start of the provided time period, in 1999, the average full-time salary in the UK was 17,803 pounds per year, with median earnings exceeding 20,000 pounds per year in 2002, and 30,000 by 2019. Wages continue to grow faster than inflation in 2025 Between November 2021 and July 2023 inflation was higher than wage growth in the UK, with wages still outpacing inflation as of March 2025. At the peak of the recent wave of high inflation in October 2022, the CPI inflation rate reached a 41-year-high of 11.1 percent, wages were growing much slower at 6.1 percent. Since that peak, inflation remained persistently high for several months, only dropping below double figures in April 2023, when inflation was 8.7 percent, down from 10.1 percent in the previous month. For 2023 as a whole, the average annual rate of inflation was 7.3 percent but fell to 2.5 percent in 2024, but is forecast to increase to 3.2 percent in 2025. Highest and lowest-paid occupations As of 2023, the highest-paid occupation in the UK was that of Chief Executives and Senior Officials, who had an average weekly pay of approximately, 1,576 pounds. By contrast, the lowest-paid occupation that year was that of retail cashiers, and check-out operators, who earned approximately 383 pounds a week. For industry sectors as a whole, people who worked full-time in the electricity, gas, steam and air conditioning supply sector had the highest average earnings, at 955 pounds a week, compared with 505 pounds a week in the accommodation and food services sector, the lowest average earnings in 2023.
The voluntarily paid living wage in the United Kingdom for 2024/25 is 12.6 pounds per hour, with this rising to 13.85 pounds per hour for workers in London. For the same year the legal minimum wage for those over the age of 21 was 11.44 pounds per hour.
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Average weekly earnings, UK, monthly.
In 2025, it is predicted that average earnings in the United Kingdom will increase by 4.3 percent, compared with a growth rate of 4.7 percent in 2024, and 7.6 percent in 2023, the fastest average earnings growth in this time period. By contrast, average earnings did not grow at all in 2020, in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic. Earnings vs inflation Although earnings grew at their fastest pace between 2021 and 2023 in this provided time period, this was offset by the period of very high inflation that occurred alongside it. This reached a peak of 11.1 percent in October 2022, with inflation only reaching the typical target rate of two percent in May 2024. Despite strong wage growth, the average UK worker saw their earnings fall relative to inflation between November 2021 and May 2023. As of January 2024, weekly wages in the UK were still growing faster than inflation, at two percent for regular pay and 1.7 percent for pay including bonuses. Full-time earnings reach over 37,000 GBP in 2024 Full-time employees in the United Kingdom earned an average annual salary of 37,430 British pounds in 2024, compared with just over 34,963 in the previous year. As of this year, men reported higher earnings than women did, with the UK reporting a gender pay gap of 13.1 percent for 2024, compared with 27.5 percent in 1997. Workers in their 40s had the highest average earnings by age group, at approximately 56,000 for men, and 44,000 for women. Although men earned more than women in all age groups, this gap was smallest among workers aged 18 to 21.
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Wages in the United Kingdom increased 5.30 percent in April of 2025 over the same month in the previous year. This dataset provides the latest reported value for - United Kingdom Average Weekly Earnings Growth - plus previous releases, historical high and low, short-term forecast and long-term prediction, economic calendar, survey consensus and news.
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Gross weekly and hourly earnings by level of occupation, UK, quarterly, not seasonally adjusted. Labour Force Survey. These are official statistics in development.
Annual earnings for women full-time workers in the United Kingdom grew by approximately 6.1 percent in 2023, while for men it grew by six percent.
From April 2025 onwards, the UK's main national minimum wage category, the national living wage, will rise to ***** pounds per hour, up from ***** pounds per hour in the previous financial year. This amount will apply to workers aged 21 and over, compared with 2022 and 2023 when it was only for workers aged 23 and over, and for those aged 25 and over between 2016 and 2021. The main minimum wage from 2010 to 2015 was the 21+ rate, and 22+ rate between 1999 and 2009. Evolution of the minimum wage Since its introduction in 1999, the minimum wage has had various rate categories, usually based on age. For the first five years, there were two categories, one for workers 18 to 21, and another for workers aged 22 and over. In 2004, a minimum wage for under 18s was introduced, and between 2010 and 2015 there were three rates based on age, and one for apprenticeships. Another age based-rate was added in 2016, but from 2024 onwards, the model will revert to four rate categories overall. In addition to the legal minimum wage, there is also a voluntary real living wage, which for 2024/25 is **** pounds per hour, rising to ***** pounds per hour for workers in London. Wages continue to outpace inflation in 2024 Since July 2023, wages have grown faster than inflation in the UK with December 2024 seeing regular weekly earnings grow by *** percent, compared with the CPI inflation rate of *** percent that month. For almost two years between November 2021 and June 2023, wage growth struggled to keep up with inflation, with the biggest gap occurring in October 2022 when inflation peaked at **** percent. The fall in real earnings in one of the most important factors in the UK's ongoing cost of living crisis. At the height of the crisis, around ** percent of UK households were reporting a monthly increase in their cost of living, with this falling to ** percent by March 2024.
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Average weekly earnings at sector level headline estimates, Great Britain, monthly, seasonally adjusted. Monthly Wages and Salaries Survey.
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Average weekly earnings at sector level including manufacturing, finance and services, Great Britain, monthly, non-seasonally adjusted. Monthly Wages and Salaries Survey.
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Wages in the United Kingdom decreased to 720 GBP/Week in April from 723 GBP/Week in March of 2025. This dataset provides - United Kingdom Average Weekly Wages - actual values, historical data, forecast, chart, statistics, economic calendar and news.
Weekly wages in the public sector of the United Kingdom grew by an average of 5.4 percent in the first quarter of 2025 when compared with the same quarter in 2024, while wages in the private sector also grew by an average of 5.4 percent.
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Average weekly earnings at industry level including manufacturing, construction and energy, Great Britain, monthly, non-seasonally adjusted. Monthly Wages and Salaries Survey.
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Children’s work and wages in Britain, 1280-1860 Sara Horrell and Jane Humphries University of Cambridge and University of Oxford 14th April 2019 Data used for ‘Children’s work and wages in Britain, 1280-1860’, Explorations in Economic History 3873 observations of children’s work and wages were collected from nearly 200 different sources to construct a series of children’s wages over the long run. The sources and the methods used to ensure a comparable dataset are detailed in the accompanying article. In brief, details on each child (sex, age, whether they worked alongside an adult), the type of work (job, occupation, sector), the remuneration (pay in cash and payment period, receipt of in kind benefits: board, lodging, clothing), year and county in which the child was observed, and details of the data source (primary, secondary; purpose for which data was originally recorded – household account, census of the poor, manorial account etc) were used to construct the initial dataset. Consistent variables were then created to reflect real reward to a day of work (payment in cash per day worked with the addition of perquisites, typically awarded for a full year but allocated pro-rata onto days of work) measured in terms of R.C. Allen’s respectability basket, and the standard of living per day in the year (cash payment for a year with the addition of a year’s worth of perquisites where applicable) relative to the cost of the Allen basket for 365 days. Initially these measures assume a constant 250 days worked in a year, but we also look at these measures under a variable working year assumption. The paper details our findings. Dataset: childwagedatadeposit.sav SPSS file, Report generates a codebook for the file Additional information: Data sources. Document detailing where the original data can be located. Linked to ‘source’ variable in the dataset.
Official statistics are produced impartially and free from political influence.
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Every year between 2013 and 2021, employees from the combined Pakistani and Bangladeshi ethnic group had the lowest average hourly pay out of all ethnic groups.
Wages for regular pay in the United Kingdom grew by approximately 5.2 percent in April 2025, although when adjusted for inflation, wages for regular pay only grew in real terms by 1.4 percent. Twenty months of inflation outpacing wages Between November 2021 and June 2023 inflation was higher than wage growth in the UK, resulting in falling real terms earnings throughout this 20-month period. While UK inflation peaked at 11.1 percent in October 2022, it was not until April 2023 that it fell below double figures, and not until May 2024 that it reached the Bank of England's target of two percent. Forecasts from the Autumn 2024 budget predict that the annual UK inflation will for 2024 will be 2.5 percent, down from 7.3 percent in 2023 and 9.1 percent in 2022. Due to high inflation, the UK's minimum wage also rose quite significantly during this period, with the "main" rate increasing from 8.91 pounds per hour in 2021 to 12.21 pounds per hour in 2025. Average earnings and gender pay gap For full-time workers in the United Kingdom, the median average annual earnings was 37,430 British pounds in 2024, compared with 34,663 pounds in 2023. In London, average earnings were significantly higher than the rest of the country, at 47,455 pounds. Just two other areas of the United Kingdom, the South East and Scotland, had annual salaries above the UK average. North East England had the lowest average salary, at 32,960 pounds. As of 2024, the gender pay gap for median gross hourly earnings in the UK was 13.1 percent for all workers, falling to seven percent for full-time workers and -3 percent for part-time workers. Compared with 1997, when the gender pay gap was 27.5 percent for all workers, there has been a degree of progress, although, at current trends, it will be some time before the gap is closed entirely.