"Much of this decline in the jobless rate is not due to improvements in the labour market, but rather to large numbers of young people dropping out of the labour force altogether due to discouragement, " the ILO says.

BBC: Youth unemployment 'set to rise'

Mr Brown vigorously rejects one criticism that, these days, is sometimes aimed at New Labour, the pro-market social-democratic force of which, along with Tony Blair, his predecessor as prime minister, and Lord Mandelson, now the business secretary, he was a progenitor: that it was a fair-weather creed.

ECONOMIST: Britain��s prime minister

As a result of China, India and the former Soviet Union embracing market capitalism, the global labour force has doubled in size.

ECONOMIST: The rich nations no longer dominate global production

His government of technocrats, which took office in November 2011, is also trying to force labour-market reform on the trade unions and fiscal compliance on Italy's legendarily tax-shy self-employed.

ECONOMIST: Italy��s prime minister