Poverty rate among working households in UK is highest ever

I do wonder how much "poverty" can be assigned to peoples lifestyles and bad choices in such a situation as you have mentioned.
Smoking is a good example. A pack a day smoker spends nigh on £310 a month on smokes. I have no sympathy for smokers who plead poverty. £310 could buy you a months worth of good food and children’s clothes.
 
Looks like neither of you actually bothered to read it before rushing to justify it. These stats are released now, but are measured up to March 2020. Before the furlough scheme.

This year's numbers will look much much worse.
So you agree that it's a worthless measurement then?
 
A single mum with 2 kids gets rent and council tax paid, and just under a grand in cash every month.

How can those children be living in poverty with that level of cash coming into the house!
Is the 1k a month after rent or before? That sounds like quite a lot of free cash really.
 
A significant proportion of it is learned helplessness but you'll get nuked from orbit if you try to argue it.

This is a fantastic book that everyone should read - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Life_at_the_Bottom
There are a lot of people at the bottom who are effectively trapped at the bottom.

Maybe some of those people made bad choices in their past. But once you're down - really down - it can be hard/impossible to get back up.

A lot of opportunities are only available to those who start near the middle. Once you're working 40+ hours a week and still struggling just to pay the rent/buy food, your options for improving your lot in life are much reduced.

Don't forget we have a lot of in-work poverty, we're not just talking about people on the dole. Plenty of it down here.
 
Its calculated as a percentage - when the population goes up so does poverty. Stupid metric should be replaced with a more sensible measure looking at regional costs/wages.

How does that work if its a percentage then? If lets say 10% of the population are living below the poverty line, it doesn't matter if the population is 60m or 600m. 10% is 10%
 
I'm not sure that's quite right - there are families reliant on food banks. The increase in the number of people relying on food banks in the past year is shocking.

Yes there is and there's still people that spend on "luxuries" like smoking and cable TV subscriptions.

If you give people the option of free stuff, the uneedy will also take it.

I'm playing devil's advocate here, I'm not a tyrant. I'm just saying.
 
Given how rich we are in this country I can't believe we still use relative poverty as a measure, a few billionaires get richer through asset inflation and 100,000's are now in poverty without being any less well off. Likewise asset price crashes and 100,000's are lifted out of poverty without gaining a pound.

I believe their are genuinely people in poverty in the UK but this is a crap measure.


you obviously don't understand statistics so ypur opinion on the definition of relative poverty is meaningless
 
I guess I'm way out of touch with the UK after 7 years but honestly how has this happened?

A working household can't find 2 or 3 quid a day to feed themselves?
I'm glad that I'm utterly out of touch.
 
Your argument that it was the result of furlough was worthless.
But if Furlough impacts it even though the evidence is, people across demographics have been able to save money hand over fist then as you agreed, as a measurement of poverty, “relative poverty” is a fairly useless one.

Think about it like this, are more people living in poverty if another group have become wealthier? Of course not, as a measurement, relative poverty is useless.

Don't get me wrong, working poverty is a problem that needs addressed (along with the benefit trap mentioned above), but measuring relative poverty is completely pointless as it's not something that has a practical solution beyond massaging the figures.
 
How does that work if its a percentage then? If lets say 10% of the population are living below the poverty line, it doesn't matter if the population is 60m or 600m. 10% is 10%

The calculation is any Household with income less than 60 per cent of the UK average are in poverty... regardless of wether they drive a lambo. Population goes up then number of people in poverty goes up. If the same calculation was performed in Monaco there would be people in poverty.
 
Not sure why peopel are banging on about those on benefits when the title is about working households?
Because a lot of working people are also on benefits perhaps. I'm sure there's a crossover point where it absolutely isn't worth getting out of bed in the morning to go to work.
edit. Just looked at Universal Credit, when you work and claim they take 63p in every pound you earn off your UC. Can't blame people for not bothering.
 
Ironically, it also encourages the government to not give pay rises to people in public sector jobs who aren’t living in relative poverty as it would create more people who are as a consequence.

Though it does incentivise giving above inflation minimum wage increases.
 
I guess I'm way out of touch with the UK after 7 years but honestly how has this happened?

A working household can't find 2 or 3 quid a day to feed themselves?
I'm glad that I'm utterly out of touch.

It happened 7 years ago as well. In fact relative poverty stopped declining around 2004 and has been pretty flat since then. Now some people will plead poverty while smoking 40 a day and running top SKY TV package but I am sure they are in the minority.
 
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