Pay awards remain remarkably weak, the latest analysis from IRS reveals [subscription required]. The median, basic pay settlement for the whole economy was unchanged at 1% in the three months to the end of August 2009. The median basic award for the previous rolling quarter has been revised down to a pay freeze. This is the first time that the headline measure has been a pay freeze in IRS's history of collecting pay settlements.
The headline figure does not tell the whole story this month however. Most deals are either a pay freeze or worth 2% or more - the median is perched in the middle. Because the sample of deals is small at this time in year, the midpoint of this range of pay deals is fluctuating more than usual.
Also of interest are the median weighted by employee numbers - which at 2.5% shows that bigger pay deals are paying better pay rises for employees - and the proportion of pay freezes overall, which is 37.6%.
Next month we will publish our annual review of pay awards, which should give a more balanced, long-term picture of the course that pay awards have plotted over the past 12 months. This is likely to confirm our picture of a pay review pattern dominated by pay freezes this year.
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