Poverty rate among working households in UK is highest ever

Soldato
Joined
6 Oct 2009
Posts
3,998
Location
London
https://www.theguardian.com/society...mong-working-households-in-uk-is-highest-ever

IPPR thinktank blames higher rents, rising property prices and childcare costs for relative poverty reaching 17.4%

The relative poverty line is defined as 60% of the median equivalised household income, with any household under this amount being described as “in poverty”. Equivalisation means that households of different types have different poverty lines. In 2018/19 the poverty line for a single person was £147 a week, whereas for a couple with two young children it was £354.

Not surprised, a return to the Victorian era, maybe even feudalism. 4.3 million children live in poverty, 31% of all children in the country. At some point we just stopped caring, and this is the result, and it's going to get much worse.
 
Caporegime
Joined
17 Feb 2006
Posts
29,263
Location
Cornwall
Still a long way to go before people start giving a crap. Especially politicians.

Even if we started sending people to work houses or gulags, most would just say, "Life is what you make of it, if you don't pull yourself up don't expect anyone else to do it for you."

Coz that's what Britain is today. I'm alright, Jack, let's put the Tories back in for 24 more years.

Don't get yer hopes up fella that we'll ever be any different. Anything left of the Tories is dirty socialism, and we don't want none of that.
 
Caporegime
Joined
17 Feb 2006
Posts
29,263
Location
Cornwall
well we'd all rather the Tories over Labour and the SNP wouldn't we? I mean c'mon man we want adults in charge not woke children.
It's a choice between Emperor Palpetine with a strap-on, or Jar Jar binks in a burqa.

Hard to get excited either way.

We can't vote for the SNP down here but they couldn't possibly be worse!
 
Soldato
Joined
26 Jan 2006
Posts
12,330
Location
Belfast
It's a choice between Emperor Palpetine with a strap-on, or Jar Jar binks in a burqa.

Hard to get excited either way.

We can't vote for the SNP down here but they couldn't possibly be worse!
If you remove the blinkers they are not that much better.
 
Caporegime
Joined
8 Sep 2005
Posts
29,981
Location
Norrbotten, Sweden.
Thing is....

Poverty in the west means only having a PS4 not 5 and your Iphone having a cracked screen.
Not chimney sweeps and gruel.

I'm not justifying it. It's only going to get worse with the breakdown of the family unit ideal and longer life expectancy.
 
Soldato
Joined
17 Nov 2003
Posts
5,290
Location
St Breward Cornwall
Some people fall badly through the cracks in the enept benefits system (non scrounging genuine types) and do require food banks.
Having said that, every time I see a food bank on TV there's a 23 stone woman big enough to have her own postcode cramming biscuits in her matalan bag
 
Associate
Joined
1 Aug 2012
Posts
682
I think a lot of people have the misconception after seeing TV shows like Benefit Britain etc that people on benefits are all living a comfy life with all the widescreen tvs and latest gadget etc.
Yes there are some people that are just plain old lazy and happy to live life on benefits. There are also some that play the system and live a very comfy life on benefits, while having other income on the side.
There are certain combinations of benefit/housing/education/skills etc that can also make living on benefits better then getting a job, specially with how the benefit system is setup with regards to people losing some of it when they get a low paid job which in turn makes them think they are better off just sitting at home and getting full benefits rather then work and end up with same money in their pockets.

But the reality of it is for most legit people benefits paid is no where enough to live a comfy life.

It seems to me like the ones that suffer the most are those that are the legit ones that might have been working and they then fall on hard times.

I work in a school, my Mrs is a Teacher. We have seen genuine poverty where children do not have the clothes, or literally come to school starving and the meals they get at school is their only/main proper meal. However I wouldn't say its in high numbers in the schools we have been in, however even 1 is too many in this country given "our" wealth.
 
Last edited:
Soldato
Joined
17 Nov 2003
Posts
5,290
Location
St Breward Cornwall
A big problem we have at work is people who come to work for a day through the agency then pack it in to go back on benefits, the agency work is guaranteed, that's what I was before been set on.
It's there but people don't want it, not even an interview just sign your name
 
Associate
Joined
1 Mar 2004
Posts
1,987
Location
Warwickshire
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=okHGCz6xxiw
Thatcher: "he'd rather have the poor poorer, provided the rich were less rich"

Relative poverty is a borderline BS metric, & is pretty much exclusively used to score emotional points that are difficult/impossible to debate against without looking like a monster - "4.3 million children living in poverty" is all the headline will ever read.

& I say this as someone who did grow up in a household that in hindsight I think would have put us towards the very bottom of any poverty metric in the UK - family of 5 in a small 1 bedroom flat. Of course I didn't really realise at the time & would actually say I had a happy childhood, probably because my parents actually gave a damn.
 
Associate
Joined
30 Oct 2011
Posts
1,191
Location
Loughborough
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.
 
Soldato
Joined
5 Mar 2010
Posts
12,347
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.

That would require far too much reading comprehension and understanding of the topic in hand than reading a headline from the daily rag.
 
Soldato
Joined
2 Apr 2009
Posts
5,436
Location
Location, Location!
Maybe if they reworked their definition and metric of what poverty actually is then people might take it more seriously. Until then these headlines just seem like a soundbite. For the report to say 31% of children live in poverty is just nonsense.
 
Soldato
Joined
13 May 2003
Posts
8,850
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.
 
Soldato
Joined
13 Nov 2006
Posts
23,988
Not even one page and we have naysayers saying labour would be worse, statistics are bull, people are scammers and fat people are fleecing food banks. Tory Britain. :D

What about the rise in use of food banks? I guess that’s all Dianne Abbott’s fault for wearing wrong shoes?
 
Back
Top Bottom