Low pay· Pay· Wealth & assets· Political parties and elections Question Time’s £80K man was wrong about the top 5%. But the super-rich are on another planet Those in his earning bracket have far more in common with workers on average pay than they do with the 1% 28 November 2019 by Torsten Bell f you live in Bolton and earn more than £80,000, you’re rich compared with your neighbours. Really rich. The average pay for all workers is just £22,000 and one in four earns less than £15,000. And yes, you’re still rich among the country as a whole: only 5% of earners make more than £80,000 – … Continued READ MORE
Social care· Living standards· Inequality & poverty· Welfare The child poverty crisis needs pushing up the agenda in Britain’s ‘Brexit’ election None of the main party manifestos will end child poverty 27 November 2019 by Laura Gardiner Both the main parties have learnt lessons from the 2017 election. The Conservatives have learnt not to scare the horses with big new policies. Their 2019 manifesto is very much a ‘safety-first’ document. Labour learnt that they have a problem with pensioners – 70-year olds are twice as likely to vote Tory as Labour – … Continued READ MORE
Tackling inequalities – left, right and centre Top of the Charts 22 November 2019 Afternoon all, We’re in manifesto week (or fortnight if the Conservatives hold off until Monday). So far the parties are going LARGE. The Lib Dems, having warned about Labour’s big tax and spend plans back in 2017, decided to…. announce a slightly bigger increase in the size of the state than Labour proposed two years … Continued READ MORE
Incomes· Low pay· Labour market· Pay Feel poor, work more – the real reason behind Britain’s record employment 13 November 2019 by Torsten Bell Why are three million more of us working today than were back in 2008? How has our employment rate reached 76 per cent, when full employment before the crisis meant 73 per cent of us working? These are employment levels no-one thought possible a decade ago. There is almost no bigger change to our economy … Continued READ MORE
Labour Market Outlook· Low pay· Pay Never had it so good? Almost back to peak pay 7 November 2019 by Nye Cominetti The last time pay peaked was in August 2007. Average weekly pay was £513, measured in 2019 prices. Over a decade later, pay is finally set to go higher. In August 2019, the latest month for which we have our most timely earnings data, average weekly pay was £511. With real pay growth at a … Continued READ MORE
Low pay· Labour market· Living Wage The evidence backing a higher minimum wage is growing 4 November 2019 by Nye Cominetti You wait for a minimum wage report and then three come along at once. This morning the Treasury published Arin Dube’s keenly awaited review of minimum wage policy in the UK. Dube backs the Chancellor’s ambitions to raise the rate to two-thirds of median hourly pay, but offers useful honesty about the risks involved, as … Continued READ MORE
Demographics· Political parties and elections The middle aged, not the middle class, are the new swing voters 2 November 2019 by Torsten Bell An election is coming. You may have noticed. The early phase of any campaign is the contest about what the election will actually be about – where the battle lines will lie. You want it to be all about Brexit if you’re gunning for the Conservatives or Liberal Democrats, and everything but Brexit if you’re … Continued READ MORE
Silicon Valley, voters and squeaky pips Top of the Charts 'Insights' round-up: October 2019 1 November 2019 The latest from Resolution Foundation Chief Executive Torsten Bell’s weekly Observer column, Insights. Read more of the latest economics and policy research in our weekly reading email, Top of the Charts (sign up here). Voters know the value of peace, even if politicians don’t When we think about violent conflicts and how to reduce them, … Continued READ MORE
Low pay· Inequality & poverty· Pay A good year for pay? Five things we learned from the Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings 2019 29 October 2019 by Nye Cominetti This morning the ONS published the Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings (ASHE) for 2019 – the most detailed data on employee pay available, telling us about high and low pay, the gender pay gap, and more besides. As a think-tank focusing on raising living standards, this is pretty crucial data for us, and for … Continued READ MORE
Labour market The flaws of the UK labour market won’t solve themselves Time to learn from other Anglo-Saxon economies 29 October 2019 Sinner or saint? The UK labour market is lauded for reaching record levels of employment at the same time as it is lacerated for the insecurities that are said to be its central feature. Two things can, however, be true at once: an economy can be job-rich at the same time as too many of … Continued READ MORE
Join The New Protest Movement – Fiscal Rebellion Top of the Charts 25 October 2019 Afternoon all, The Budget’s off. This is very good news for the RF team’s workload. But it is very bad news for democracy, if the election’s still on. That’s because no Budget means no updated Office for Budget Responsibility forecasts for our economy and public finances – forecasts that should provide crucial context for the … Continued READ MORE
Intergenerational Centre What is generational fairness? David Runciman speech on intergenerational fairness and political representation 21 October 2019 by Professor David Runciman This article summarises a speech by Professor David Runciman at a recent Intergenerational Centre event exploring what the concept of generational fairness means for our politics, economics and society. You can watch the full event on our event page. This article does not necessarily reflect the views of the Resolution Foundation. In the coming months … Continued READ MORE
A slowing, bickering, changing world Top of the Charts 18 October 2019 Afternoon all, So, Boris Johnson has chosen his Brexiteers over unionism. The EU have chosen getting it done versus hoping remainers get their act together. The DUP have chosen a rock, having been offered a hard place. Labour want to choose a referendum, but may get a general election. The slightly odd thing of course … Continued READ MORE
Skills Are higher-level apprenticeships going to better-off apprentices? What the new Department of Education statistics tell us 12 October 2019 by Kathleen Henehan This morning the Department for Education (DfE) published figures on the number of apprenticeships that were started in July 2019 – the final month of the 2018/19 academic year. And although the numbers are still provisional, they provide us with a pretty clear picture of how things shaped up for the apprenticeships sector. The big … Continued READ MORE
Tax For The Rich, Naps For The Poor Top of the Charts 11 October 2019 Afternoon all, The pressure has been building for years. Frustration has been mounting. But now it’s DECISION TIME, people. Which side are you on? Not on Brexit, or Extinction Rebellion vs the cops (which was all very friendly in the camp outside RF towers). No, on the real question facing 21st Century Britain: Coleen vs Rebekah. … Continued READ MORE
Efficiency vs happiness, talent vs practice – and military service vs crime? Top of the Charts 'Insights' round-up: September 2019 7 October 2019 The latest from Resolution Foundation Chief Executive Torsten Bell’s weekly Observer column, Insights. Read more of the latest economics and policy research in our weekly reading email, Top of the Charts (sign up here). Military service is not a magic bullet for reducing crime We’re in an era of “bring-backery” – blue passports are on the way … Continued READ MORE
WeWork wobbles as Warren woos workers Top of the Charts 4 October 2019 Afternoon all, Tory/Labour conferences* are done. Brexit is not. But you have to take what closure you can get. Labour had a lot of policy, but not a lot of unity, while the Tories managed unity on Brexit and not a lot of policy (a higher minimum wage was the big exception). Just like journalists and … Continued READ MORE
Robo-Taxes, Expensive Tweets And Equations For Art-Lovers Top of the Charts 13 September 2019 Afternoon all, So Parliament’s off. The Speaker is too (rather more permanently). This is clearly a crisis. With millions of Brits addicted to the nightly Commons meltdowns, dark times are ahead. Where we once had soaps, all that’s left these days is psephology. Now the addicts out there may get some relief from prorogation cold-turkey … Continued READ MORE
Labour market· Pay The labour market is delivering on jobs and pay – it is vital for living standards that we keep it that way 10 September 2019 by Nye Cominetti A tight labour market is finally delivering decent pay growth. In the three months to July 2019, average weekly regular pay (i.e. excluding bonuses) grew by 1.9 per cent on the previous year (slightly down on the previous month). Given that average real pay grew by 2.1 per cent in the eight years prior to … Continued READ MORE
Leading Britain through Brexit: Five lessons for Boris Johnson 24 July 2019 by Torsten Bell When the history books of our era are written they will say that Britain had a huge financial crisis, then it left the EU. In those books Boris Johnson’s legacy as Prime Minister will be Brexit – and the politics and economics of Brexit are hard. Hard substantively, because they involve unravelling 40 years of … Continued READ MORE
Blowing the Budget and how to train your Dictator Top of the Charts 19 July 2019 Sign up for our weekly Top of the Charts email here Afternoon all, I’m afraid a rather serious mood is dominating at RF towers today. It’s Theresa May’s last weekend as Prime Minister. It’s (probably) Boris Johnson’s last weekend for a while without that responsibility sitting on his shoulders. She should, and I’m sure will be, sad … Continued READ MORE
Intergenerational Centre War and peace – David Willetts reviews two of the latest books on Intergenerational equity for the Financial Times 3 July 2019 by David Willetts Class used to predict how people would vote in Britain and elsewhere — in 1974 if you were a member of the working class you were three times more likely to vote Labour than Conservative. Now the distribution of votes by class in the UK is almost even between Labour and Conservative: the new divide … Continued READ MORE
Wealth & assets· Housing Who owns Britain’s £13tn wealth? 2 July 2019 by George Bangham Britain is in the middle of a decades-long wealth boom. Total wealth now stands at a record £12.8tn, or almost 13 million millions. But where you live, and when you were born plays a big part in how much of that wealth you are likely to own. In the 1960s and 1970s, Britain’s collective wealth … Continued READ MORE
Roasting, rocking and roaring across Britain Top of the Charts 28 June 2019 Afternoon all, The country’s roasting, Glastonbury’s rocking, and the Lionesses are roaring into the World Cup semi-final. The only people letting the side down are our cricket team. Now I’m no expert on bat/ball games, but I fear they’ve been paying just a bit too much attention to Boris. Surely the point of being the … Continued READ MORE
Rising floors and tumbling walls Top of the Charts 14 June 2019 Afternoon all, It’s time for a break from the rain and the ludicrous tax cut promises the Tory leadership election has given us (on which more below). So not only does this week’s Top of the Charts come to you from (ludicrously hot) Vienna but we’ve gone all international in our reads. From big moves … Continued READ MORE
