Super rich pull in the cash

The first study, "Poverty and wealth across Britain 1968 to 2005", by a team of eight academics from the Universities of Sheffield, Bristol and London, found that the 1% richest people have boosted their personal wealth.

Increasing wealth

This 1% richest owned 17% of national assets in 1991 but by 2002 this had risen further to 24%. There has also been a rise in the number of people known as ‘asset wealthy’, who now make up nearly a quarter of the population of Britain.

Over the same period, indeed since Margaret Thatcher was elected in 1979, the number of people in poverty (known as the breadline poor) has risen sharply from about 17% to 27% of the population. The only good news is that the numbers in extreme poverty, referred to as the core poor, have fallen since about 1990, the year Thatcher resigned as Prime Minister.

Since the number of poor and rich people has risen, the middle group has declined from about two-thirds of the population to one half.

Growing inequality

Consequently the academics conclude that there has been growing inequality, taking us back to levels not seen for 40 years. There is also greater polarisation, in the sense that rich and poor are increasingly segregated according to where they live.

In particular, the top group of ‘exclusive wealthy’ appear to be concentrated in a smaller number of areas, notably the stockbroker belt round London. The core poor, by contrast, are most likely to live in inner city London, Birmingham and other large cities.

Public attitudes to inequality

The second report, 'Public attitudes to economic inequality', by Michael Orton from the University of Warwick and Karen Rowlingson from the University of Birmingham, reveals that 73% of people believe the gap between high and low incomes is too big.

They did not necessarily think that low earners were under-paid but they did think the top earners were very over-paid, according to a survey carried out in 2004.

Moreover, people were ambiguous and apparently contradictory about how to correct the problem and less than 30% believed the government should take money from the high earners and give it to those on low wages.

There is evidence, however, of support for redistribution by other means. For example 62% of people favoured a mix of tax and benefits that would transfer money from rich to poor.

In addition, 38% of people in 2004 said the government is doing too little to redistribute income from the better-off to those who are less well-off and only 13% said it was doing too much.

Inequality in Northern Ireland

SCOPE magazine recently analysed incomes in Northern Ireland and showed a huge growth in inequality in recent years. For example, in 2006 the highest paid 10% enjoyed another big pay rise but the incomes of the bottom 10% actually declined.