Scottish cities
Employment rates for selected Scottish cities and Scotland, 2004 - 2022
Employment rates in Scotland's four largest cities have fluctuated over the last two decades. The employment rate in Glasgow has risen from a low point in 2012, when the rate was 58%, to 72% in 2022.
Employment rates for selected Scottish cities and Scotland, 2022
In 2022, 72% of working-age Glaswegians were employed. Glasgow's employment rate is 2% lower than the Scottish average.
Percentage in full-time employment aged 16-64, selected Scottish cities and Scotland, 2022
More than three quarters (78%) of working-age people in employment work full-time in Glasgow, which is above the Scottish average.
Job density: the number of jobs per working-age resident and is used as indicator of labour demand. A job density greater than one indicates that there is more than one job per person for the working-age population. In 2021, job density in Glasgow was 1.03, which was higher than the Scottish average. Over the last two decades, all Scottish cities have consistently had higher job density levels than Scotland as a whole.
Employment by gender for selected Scottish cities and Scotland, 2022
Nationally and in both Glasgow and Aberdeen, male employment rates were higher than female employment rates in 2022. In Glasgow, 76% of adult males and 69% of adult females were in employment in 2022. The male rate of employment in Glasgow was similar to the Scottish average, but the female rate of employment was lower than the Scottish average.
In contrast, in Edinburgh and in Dundee the female employment rate was higher than the male employment rate. In Edinburgh, both rates were higher than the Scottish average; in Dundee, both rates were lower than the Scottish average.
Migrant workers as percentage of total in employment aged 16-64 in selected Scottish cities and Scotland 2022
There are more migrant workers (people in employment born outside the UK) as a proportion of the workforce in each of the selected Scottish cities than in Scotland as a whole. In 2022, 22% of people in employment in Glasgow were migrant workers. The figure was even higher in Aberdeen (28%) and in Edinburgh (33%).
Notes
The Labour Force Survey (LFS) definition of employment is anyone (aged 16 or over) who does at least one hour’s paid work in the week prior to their LFS interview, or has a job that they are temporarily away from (e.g. on holiday). Also included are people who do unpaid work in a family business and people on government supported employment training schemes, in line with ILO definitions.
The headline employment rate is the proportion of the working-age population who are in employment. The working-age population comprises men aged 16-64 and women aged 16-59 and therefore takes account of the school-leaving age but does not align completely with the state pension age which has risen in recent years.
The full-time/part-time split is based on respondent self-classification. Respondents are asked whether they work full-time or part-time in their main job.
The measure of migrant workers used is defined as: people in employment who were not born in the UK, expressed as a precentage of all people in employment in an area.