Retail Employment in the Current Recession Available to Purchase

The retail trades are an important employer of labour in Britain. The Retail Inquiry of 1982 found that there were 2.202 million people engaged in the retail trades (British Business, 1983). This figure includes self‐employed and casual workers. The 1981 Census of Employment recorded that retailing (1968 S.I.C.) had 1.863 million employees in employment, i.e. 8.8 per cent of the British employees in employment total. On revision to the 1980 S.I.C., the figures became 2.049 million and 9.7 per cent of the total in employment. The Census of Employment excludes the self‐employed. The present economic recession has severely contracted employment, and especially manufacturing employment (see, for example, Townsend, 1983). Little is known, however, about the impact of the recession on the retail trades, despite their importance as a source of employment.