More than 24 million Brits don’t earn enough for a ‘decent standard of living’, report finds

More than one in three people in the UK have insufficient incomes to afford a “decent standard of living”, a new report has found. That equates to more than 24 million people living in households which earn less than the minimum income standard – the lowest amount people need to participate in society, as determined by the public.

According to the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, a single person needs to earn £28,000 a year for an acceptable standard of living in 2024. A couple with two children need £69,400 a year between them.

Loughborough’s Centre for Research in Social Policy has now found that in 2022 to 2023, 35.8% of all individuals were blow the minimum income standard, up from 30.4% in 2021 to 2022.

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Dr Elaine Robinson, a research associate at the centre, said: “The sharp rise in the number of people struggling to maintain a decent standard of living in 2022 to 2023 is a real cause for concern and poses a substantial policy challenge.

“Increasingly stretched incomes are simply not meeting the high cost of essentials, and rising housing costs, especially for private renters, are exacerbating the situation.”

More than seven in 10 (72.3%) individuals in social housing and more than half (56.9%) of those in private rented accommodation were below minimum income standards.

Robinson explained that for many, work is no longer a clear route out of financial hardship. Two out of every three working age households below the minimum income standard have someone in work.

“Pensioners are also starting to feel the strain, and the loss of the winter fuel payment for many low-income pensioners won’t help,” Robinson added.

The number of single pensioners below the minimum income standard had more than doubled since 2008 to 2009, rising from 16.9% to 34.5% in 2022 to 2023. This is before the winter fuel payment was removed.

“Support is needed across all stages of life to make a material difference to people’s lives. Policy must tackle inadequate incomes and mitigate against rising costs, not just for one group but across society,” Robinson added.

Children and families are most impacted. Just under half (48.6%) of children in the UK were living below the minimum income standard in 2022 to 2023. Those in single parent families were most affected, with four in five (81.6%) growing up in households with inadequate incomes compared to 38.7% in couple.

Professor Matt Padley, co-director of the Centre for Research in Social Policy, said the “decline in living standards over recent years has been stark”, with 7.5 million more people living in households with inadequate incomes in 2022 to 2023 than were in 2008 to 2009.

Meanwhile, more than half (51.5%) of 16 to 24-year-olds were below minimum income standard, which is substantially more than any other working-age group.

“There is an opportunity to take bold policy decisions to make this a reality: delivering a child poverty strategy that commits to undoing the damage caused by the two-child limit; investing in housing that is affordable, accessible and built where it is needed; making sure workers are paid a genuinely living wage, for the hours they need, in employment that is secure,” Padley said.

More than three times as many children in working households (5.3 million) were below minimum income standards compared to those with parents or guardians who were out of work (1.7 million), showing that employment is not a guaranteed route to financial security.

Peter Matejic, chief analyst at Joseph Rowntree Foundation, added: “While overall progress has stagnated for some time, the living standards problem has grown more acute in recent years. For our economy to grow we need people to feel secure enough to take an active part in it. We can’t expect them to wait for economic growth before their dire financial situation improves.

“Without direct policy action people are unlikely to feel they have a strong foundation on which to build their lives. The government’s mission for growth must place people experiencing hardship on a surer footing. This starts with making sure universal credit covers the costs of essentials like food and household bills.”

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