Occupation and Earning - December 2014

Published: December 2014

Economic Factsheet - Occupations and Earnings - December 2014
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Occupational structure (June 2014)

% of all people in employment by occupation

Area	Somerset	Mendip	Sedgemoor	South Somerset	Taunton Deane	West Somerset	HotSW LEP	UK
Managers, directors and senior officials	11.6	10.4	15.1	12.5	7.6	14.2	10.6	10.1
Professional	14.7	20	15.1	13	15.3	N/A	16.5	19.8
Associate professional & technical	10.3	10.7	5.5	11.6	15.2	N/A	11.5	14.1
Admin & secretarial	9.2	6.6	13.2	4.5	12	17.9	10	10.7
Skilled trades	14.6	12.7	15.2	14.1	13.4	27.3	13.5	10.7
Caring, leisure & other service	12.3	11.5	6.6	13.3	15	21.2	11	9.1
Sales & customer service	8.7	8.1	7.3	12	6.5	6.1	8.1	7.8
Process, plant & machine operatives	6.9	9.5	8.6	5.8	5.2	N/A	5.9	6.3
Elementary occupations	11.6	10.6	13.5	12.9	9.9	N/A	12.4	10.7

Source: Annual Population Survey, NOMIS 2014 (*Some data unavailable due to small sample size)

The largest occupation groups in Somerset are professional roles (14.7%) and skilled trades (14.6%), compared to 19.8% and 10.7% respectively at a national level. Managers, directors and senior officials are well represented in all Somerset districts except Taunton Deane compared to the UK as a whole. The proportion of people employed in admin and secretarial occupations in Somerset fell by 1.8% between 2013 and 2014. In contrast, the caring, leisure and other service occupations showed an increase of 2.5% over the same period.

(Click to enlarge) Source: Annual Population Survey, NOMIS 2014. Graph uses annual data at March each year.

Public sector employment (June 2014)

% of people in employment who work in the public sector

Area	% Public Sector June 2008	% Public Sector June 2014	Change 2008-2014
Somerset	20.7	18.4	-2.3
Mendip	18.5	19.8	1.3
Sedgemoor	16.9	17.8	0.9
South Somerset	19.8	14.7	-5.1
Taunton Deane	28.8	22.7	-6.1
West Somerset	17.7	19.4	1.7
Heart of the South West LEP	23.9	23.1	-0.8
UK	24.0	23.5	-0.5

Source: Annual Population Survey, NOMIS 2014. *Estimate and confidence interval unreliable since the group sample size is small.

Somerset has a slightly smaller proportion of people employed in the public sector than the UK and Heart of the South West area; 20.7% compared to 24% and 23.9% respectively.

Within the County there is a concentration of public sector employment in Taunton Deane (28.8%).

Public sector employment in Somerset peaked at 23.5% of the workforce in 2011. Since then, the number of people employed in the public sector in the County has decreased from 56,400 to 45,000 (-20.2%).

Source: Annual Population Survey, NOMIS 2014

Earnings (2014)

Source: Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings (ASHE), NOMIS 2013 (updated annually). Figures are not available for Sedgemoor due to statistical unreliability. ASHE data is not produced for LEP areas.

Average earnings in Somerset consistently lag behind the UK level. Mendip has the highest median earnings in the County (£26,506), an increase of 4.3% over the year. West Somerset has the lowest (£20,629) median earnings, Taunton Deane had the highest increase of 11% (£25,810) The median is the value below which 50% of employees’ earnings fall.

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86.3% of people living here are very or fairly satisfied with where they live, well above the national average of 78.6% (The Place Survey, 2008).