One in 10 workers underemployed

28 November 2012 Last updated at 13:21 GMT Penny Cook has asked her part-time employer for more hours but has been refused

One in 10 of all workers in the UK is now officially underemployed, according to a study from the Office For National Statistics (ONS).

It says 3.05 million workers want to work more hours each week, out of a total workforce of 29.41 million.

The number of workers in this position has shot up by 980,000 in the four years since the start of the economic recession in 2008.

Most of the underemployment is concentrated among part-time workers.

The main reason for the growth of underemployment has been the economic downturn of the past few years.

"During this period many workers moved from full-time to part-time roles and many of those returning to work after a period of unemployment could only find part-time jobs," the statistical office said.

"Of the extra one million underemployed workers in 2012 compared with 2008, three-quarters were in part-time posts."

The ONS said 1.9 million of the underemployed were in part-time jobs and this meant, in turn, that 24% of all part-timers wanted more work.

By contrast, only 5.5% of full-time staff said they wanted to work more hours.

Each quarter, as part of its Labour Force Survey (LFS), the ONS asks respondents a series of questions about their willingness and ability to work more hours.

Someone is counted as underemployed if they are working fewer hours than they would like.

Continue reading the main story The growth of underemployment has gone alongside a big fall in the real value of earnings, the ONS said, which have been outstripped by inflation in recent years.

Jane Tomlinson, a part-time worker from Oxford, told the BBC what it had been like to be underemployed for the past year.

"I work only 15 hours a week paid work for a charity as communications manager," she said.

"I don't actually want a full-time job, but I need more than 15 hours a week, so I pick up a bit of copywriting work here and there as I can find it.

"But month to month it's really tough as I make only just enough to pay the bills. Thank goodness my husband has a job," she added.

'Half-time salaries'

Caroline Parre, an academic from Birmingham, said for the past three years the recession had prevented her hours being extended.

Continue reading the main story

With part-timers we can contract and expand our workforce relative to increases and decreases in orders received,”

End Quote Colin Johnson An employer from Lincoln "Recruited to set up a research centre, the expectation had always been the part-time job would convert into full-time employment. The recession has changed that hope," she said.

"There is danger in the situation: to enable the success of the venture I have, voluntarily, worked full-time hours on a part-time salary, in the hope and belief that efforts would be rewarded.

"Efforts, of course, are not rewarded, and employers find themselves in the happy position of paying full time workers half-time salaries," she pointed out.

But a spokeswoman for the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) said the figures showed that three quarters of all part-time staff appeared to be content.

"Part-time working suits millions of people and gives others the skills and experience to find a different job or take advantage of longer hours when they are available," she said.

"For many people it is an important step to full-time work and coming off benefits."

This was backed up by Colin Johnson, who runs a mail order company in Lincoln and who told the BBC his staff were happy to work part-time.

"All of my employees are technically part-time. Some are working mums who work around schooling," he said.

"With part-timers we can contract and expand our workforce relative to increases and decreases in orders received, and we can dovetail staff to deal with peaks on the phone.

"Prior to this way of working we would have out-sourced, so these are new jobs," he added.

Self-employed

The ONS explained that most of the rise in underemployment took place between 2008 and 2009, when the recession first gripped the UK economy.

ONS statistician Jamie Jenkins: "Underemployment has gone up by one million people since the economic crisis"

Since then it has still been rising, though more slowly then before.

According to the ONS analysis, the problem is worst among the lowest paid, young workers and those in low-skilled jobs, such as labourers, cleaners and catering staff.

The shortage of work has also led to a big rise in the level of underemployment reported by the self-employed.

They are now even more likely to report being underemployed than those who work for others.

However the precise reasons for individuals being underemployed can vary.

The ONS said these reasons could include:

employers only being able to offer a few hours of work each week workers, such as bar staff, being in jobs where they are only required for a few hours a day personal circumstances changing so that someone now wants to work more hours then beforepeople settling for a part-time job as second-best when they would much rather have a full-time one

Labour market economist John Philpott said: "Approaching one in five economically active people are struggling in today's 'no or not enough work' economy.

"Add in the effect of falling real take-home pay for the vast majority of people in work and it becomes clear how much distress is being suffered."

The TUC's general secretary, Brendan Barber, said: "Being underemployed carries a huge pay penalty that puts a real strain on people's finances.

"Long periods of underemployment can cause longer term career damage, which is particularly worrying for the one in five young people currently trapped in it."

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FAST FOOD WORKERS STRIKE

Pamela Waldron, who has worked at a New York City KFC for 8 years, joined dozens of other fast food workers protesting for higher pay and the right to form a union outside of a Burger King Thursday.

NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- Pamela Waldron makes $7.75 an hour as a cashier at the KFC in New York's Penn Station, where she has worked for eight years.

That's just 50 cents above the New York state minimum wage. The 26-year old nursing student, and mother of two, says she has asked for a raise but her pleas have gone unheeded for weeks.

Finally, on Thursday, around lunchtime she joined a protest of about 40 fast food workers who walked out of their shifts, carrying placards and shouting slogans to bring attention to their cause of fighting for higher wages and the right to unionize. The protest was held outside a Burger King (BKW) near Penn Station.

"We're the ones who run the store day in and day out, and it's not easy," said Waldron.

Earlier, Thursday morning, 14 workers from a midtown Manhattan McDonald's (MCD, Fortune 500) location also walked out of their shifts in protest, according to a community organization New York Communities for Change.

The group said it had organized several protests at different locations in the city, including Times Square and the Fulton Street Mall in Brooklyn. Workers from McDonald's, Burger King, and Yum Brand (YUM, Fortune 500)-run restaurants KFC and Taco Bell are expected to join.

Workers say they are asking for a pay raise to $15 an hour and the right to form a union. Currently, the median pay for the nearly 50,000 fast food workers in New York City is $9 an hour, or $18,500 a year, according to the New York Labor Department. That's about $4,500 lower than Census Bureau's poverty income threshold level of $23,000 for a family of four.

KFC worker Waldron says she would be homeless with her kids if it were not for her husband's union-represented job at the grocery store chain Pathmark.

Under the National Labor Relations Act, workers are protected from retaliation as long as they work in concert with at least one other employee to try to change their working conditions. However, they can be "permanently replaced" if they strike for purely economic reasons, according to Ken Margolies, a senior associate at the Worker Institute at Cornell University.

"The workers who strike are taking a significant risk that takes a lot of courage," Margolies said.

Related: Fast food sales slow in China

Raymond Lopez, a 21-year old shift manager at the midtown Manhattan McDonald's, was one of the workers protesting Thursday morning. Lopez makes $8.75 an hour, after working at the hamburger joint for two years. Despite a 40-hour work week, Lopez works two more jobs to supplement his income, a part-time job at a condominium and at a caterer to pay his bills and his $500 student loan payments each month.

"I wouldn't be able to survive just working at McDonald's," he said.

According to Jonathon Westin, the organizing director for New York Communities for Change, workers like Lopez can't afford rent or to put food on the table with their meager wages.

"Many of these workers have to rely on government assistance because they're being paid poverty wages," he said.

The New York Communities for Change is supported by several unions, including UnitedNY, the Black Institute and the Service Employees International Union. Together the unions represent employees at grocery stores, government, hospitals, and also African American workers.

McDonald's said in a statement that the chain has an open dialogue with its employees and welcomes them to express concerns.

"McDonald's values our employees and has consistently remained committed to them, so in turn they can provide quality service to our customers," the fast food retailer said. The statement added that the majority of McDonald's restaurants are owned and operated by independent business people.

Rick Cisneros, the owner of the midtown McDonald's franchise location, said in a statement that he always encourages employees to provide feedback so that he can be an even better employer.

Organizers of the protests say that workers are planning to go back to work tomorrow.

Labor experts say there have been scattered attempts to organize over the last several decades, but very little in the fast food industry has stuck. Many say that's because there is a high labor turnover rate in the industry.

According to Cornell University's Margolies, unions haven't been able to get enough workers to organize an election to form a union.

Workers at Starbucks (SBUX, Fortune 500) and sandwich store Jimmy Johns made some headway, but those efforts didn't go anywhere.

Margolies said this is part of a larger movement of low wage workers to improve their economic positions and treatment on the job. Last week, hundreds of Wal-Mart workers protested on Black Friday against retaliation after speaking out for higher pay, fair hours and more affordable health care.

First Published: November 29, 2012: 12:16 PM ET

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Protesters blast Wal-Mart treatment of workers

NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- Hundreds of people -- including some employees -- have taken part in Black Friday demonstrations at Wal-Mart stores nationwide, protesting what they say is the retailer's retaliation against speaking out for better pay, fair schedules and affordable health care.

According to organizers from the union-backed group OUR Walmart, hundreds of workers and thousands of supporters rallied across 100 cities, including Landover Hills, Md., Miami, Oakland, Calif., Chicago, Danville, Ky., Dallas and Kenosha, Wis.

Wal-Mart pushed back, saying it knew of only a "few dozen" protests, and that most of the protesters were not its employees

In one of the biggest protests, nine people were arrested outside of a Paramount, Calif., Wal-Mart store for failing to disperse, according to a Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department statement. An OUR Walmart spokesman said three of those arrested were Wal-Mart workers. Those arrested were to be released without bail, unless they had previous arrest warrants.

The sheriff's department said about 1,000 people arrived by bus and private vehicles to participate in the Paramount protest, which was characterized as peaceful.

In Landover Hills, near Washington. D.C. ,organizers said about 350 people participated, although video of the event showed around 100 participants. Dawn Le, who works for the United Food and Commercial Workers Union, which backs OUR Walmart, would not say how many of those taking part were Wal-Mart employees.

Wal-Mart (WMT, Fortune 500), in a statement late Friday, said worker absenteeism was down more than 60% from last year.

"We had our best Black Friday ever and OUR Walmart was unable to recruit more than a small number of associates to participate in these made for TV events," said David Tovar, vice president of corporate communications, in the statement. "Press reports are now exposing what we have said all along -- the large majority of protesters aren't even Walmart workers."

Janna Pea, an OUR Wal-Mart organizer in Dallas, said about 40 workers and about 150 supporters took part in a protest Thursday night.

One of those with her was Josue Mata, who says he walked off his job as an overnight maintenance employee to protest retaliation against people who want to speak out.

"I have four kids and I don't want them to grown up in a society where people disrespect them," he said. "This is a never-ending fight and we're never going to stop."

Related: Wal-Mart: Crowded, and not everyone is smiling.

Mata said he plans to return to work for his next scheduled shift on Sunday evening.

Pea said her protesters went to four Wal-Mart stores across the Dallas area, and while they were able to picket and speak to customers at half of them, they were asked to leave immediately by police at the others.

"We were still able to talk to customers and educate them about what was going on," she said. "We saw one person who was planning to go shopping, but then didn't end up going in. Instead, they rallied with us."

Muhammed Malik, who helped organize a protest at a Miami Wal-Mart, said roughly 70 workers participated in their hour-long demonstration Thursday night. He said one worker walked off his shift as he saw others rallying outside.

Wal-Mart has denied that it has retaliated against protesting workers, and said Friday that it has offered special holiday discounts to its employees for their efforts this season.

The protests were limited in scope, occurring at a handful of the company's approximately 4,000 U.S. stores. One employee at a store near Pittsburgh told CNNMoney he had heard of the protests only through the media.

Related: Black Friday shoppers out in full force

In an effort to stop the protests, Wal-Mart filed a complaint last week with the National Labor Relations Board, claiming that the demonstrations violated labor laws.

The retailer said the actions have disrupted business, and that the workers' ongoing actions violate the National Labor Relations Act, which prohibits picketing for any period over 30 days without filing a petition to form a union.

On Tuesday, OUR Walmart filed its own charge with the federal agency, claiming that Wal-Mart tried to deter workers from participating in the protests and interfered with their right to speak up.

But the NLRB was not able to rule in time or issue an injunction. Nancy Cleeland, a spokeswoman for the NLRB, said the complaint is too complex to make a ruling so soon.

Despite the talk of the protests, Wal-Mart reported larger Thanksgiving and Black Friday crowds than last year. As of Friday morning, the company said it had processed nearly 10 million register transactions.

Shares of Wal-Mart rose 1.9% in Friday trading.

First Published: November 23, 2012: 11:48 AM ET

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