Topic description and stories

Getting ‘work’ right is good for people and the nation. It contributes to increasing productivity, better living standards and economic growth.

One day of paid work a week is all we need to get mental health benefits of employment

19 June 2019

Latest research finds up to eight hours of paid work a week significantly boosts mental health and life satisfaction. However, researchers found little evidence that any more hours – including a full five-day week – provide further increases in wellbeing. 

Read more
UK Chancellor Rishi Sunak at a Covid-19 press conference. Sunak is credited with instigating the UK's 'furlough' job retention scheme.

Furlough ‘stemmed the tide’ of poor mental health during UK lockdown, study suggests

24 Jul 2020

Researchers say the UK government should ask employers to share out reduced hours rather than lose workers, in order to mitigate a looming mental...

Read more
Chef in Soho, London.

Women bear brunt of coronavirus economic shutdown in UK and US

21 Apr 2020

New data shows women and people who did not go to university are more likely to have lost work and earnings since mid-March.

Read more
Person sitting on sofa with laptop

Opinion: Coronavirus: five ways to be a better manager when working from home

25 Mar 2020

Everyone is adjusting to life during the coronavirus pandemic. For many, working from home is the new normal and poses all sorts of new challenges...

Read more

Living on the edge

29 Mar 2019

Some of the most deprived areas in England are located in the eastern region. The New Horizons project has been helping those furthest away from the...

Read more

AI: Life in the age of intelligent machines

22 Feb 2019

In a new film, leading Cambridge University researchers discuss the far-reaching advances offered by artificial intelligence – and consider the...

Read more
Steel workers

Legislating labour in the long run – how worker rights help economies

12 Jul 2018

Researchers have built the single largest dataset of employment laws – spanning more than 100 countries across much of post-war history – to look at...

Read more

Humans need not apply

05 Jul 2018

Will automation, AI and robotics mean a jobless future, or will their productivity free us to innovate and explore? Is the impact of new technologies...

Read more

How 9,000 lists written over 300 years are helping to test theories of economic growth

03 Jul 2018

The handwritten inventories had lain largely untouched for centuries. Sand used to dry the ink still lay between the pages. Written neatly inside...

Read more

Mend the gap: solving the UK’s productivity puzzle

28 Jun 2018

When it comes to the output, education and wellbeing of the Great British workforce, our towns, cities and regions exist on a dramatically unequal...

Read more

The stresses and strains of work and unemployment

26 Jun 2018

A stressful workplace can damage your health. But so too can being out of work. Cambridge researchers are trying to understand why both situations...

Read more

The fifty-percenters: the economic value of education

22 Jun 2018

Almost half of young people in the UK now go to university. Who gets in – and what and where they study – affects a person’s place in society and...

Read more
Unsplash

The boss of me: myths and truths of self-employment

20 Jun 2018

While self-employment may not be the labour market remedy some want to believe, new research is revealing its global prevalence and intergenerational...

Read more

Pages