Economic Activity

Scotland’s Census 2022 collected information on economic activity. This question asked people aged 16 and over if they were working or looking for work the week before they responded in the Census. It measures if a person was an active participant in the labour market and provides insight into employment, unemployment, and economic status.

Economic Activity: Ages 16 to 34

The majority of young non-binary people aged 16 to 34 were either economically active as full-time or part-time employees (45.9%) or economically inactive due to being students (27.3%). This is a similar pattern to the rest of people aged 16 to 34 in Scotland (excluding non-binary people), however a larger proportion were employees (64.7%) and a smaller proportion were students (15.6%) (Table 7). The higher proportion of young non-binary people being economically inactive due to being students is consistent with the finding in the Student Status and Qualifications section of this report. Nearly half of non-binary people aged 16 to 34 were full-time students compared to less than a third of the rest of Scotland’s population aged 16 to 34 (47.4% compared to 27.9%). Note that the proportion of non-binary people with a student status (47.4%) is higher than the proportion of non-binary people who were students and not economically active (27.3%), because this variable does not count those with a student status who are in employment or self-employment either full or part-time.

Young non-binary people, in comparison to the rest of young people in Scotland, were more likely to be unemployed and available for work (10.2% compared to 5.7%) as well as economically inactive due to long-term sickness or disability (6.6% compared to 3.0%). This is consistent with the finding that a higher proportion of young non-binary people reported being limited a lot or a little by a long-term health condition or disability compared to the rest of young people in Scotland (45.7% compared to 14.2%, as presented in the General Health and Disability by Age section of this report).

Table 7: Economic activity of non-binary people and the rest of Scotland, aged 16 to 34

Source: Scotland’s Census 2022

Economic Activity: Ages 35 and older

A little less than half of non-binary people aged 35 and older were economically active as employees either full-time or part time (48.9%). This is comparable to the rest of Scotland (excluding non-binary people) aged 35 and over (45.2%). Older non-binary people were also more likely to be economically active in self-employment than the rest of Scotland aged 35 and over (12.6% compared to 8.5%) (Table 8).

Similar to younger non-binary people, older non-binary people aged 35 and over were more likely to be economically inactive due to long-term sickness or disability than the rest of Scotland aged 35 and over (13.0% compared to 6.1%). In comparison to the rest of Scotland, there is a smaller proportion of non-binary people aged 35 and older who were economically inactive due to being retired (Table 8). This is likely influenced by the younger age profile of the non-binary population. Only 2.4% of the non-binary people recorded in the 2022 Census were 65 and older, and therefore close to the pension age of 66 in 2022.

Table 8: Economic activity of non-binary people and the rest of Scotland, aged 35 and older

Note: Where an asterisk (*) has been placed in the table, the sample size for the statistic is below 100. Caution is advised for interpreting smaller results, because it would only take a small amount of variation in the data to see a large apparent effect on the analysis of the data.

Source: Scotland’s Census 2022