Poverty in the United Kingdom is the condition experienced by the portion of the population of the United Kingdom that lacks adequate financial resources for a certain standard of living, as defined under the various measures of poverty.
Data based on incomes published in 2016 by the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) show that, after housing costs have been taken into consideration, the number of people living in the UK in relative poverty to be 13.44M (21% of the population). The Joseph Rowntree Foundation (JRF), reported that in 2021, about 1 in 5 ( 20%) of people in the UK lived in poverty. In their report, the JRF said that over the last 25 years, children have had the highest poverty rates. Despite this, poverty in children has still gone down significantly, going from about a third (34%) of all children living in poverty to what it is today (27%).
In 2019, Full Fact found that the British poverty rate is "almost exactly the same level as the EU average (17%)", much lower than the DWP figures due to differences in calculation methods between countries.
In 2018, Philip Alston, the UN Special Rapporteur on extreme poverty and human rights said that British Government policies and cuts to social support "are entrenching high levels of poverty and inflicting unnecessary misery", "driven by a political desire to undertake social re-engineering rather than economic necessity". His report was rejected by the British Government, pointing to rising household incomes, declining income inequality and one million people fewer in absolute poverty since 2010.
History Before 1950s
The history of poverty in the United Kingdom before 1950 reflects a complex interplay of social, economic, and political forces that shaped the lives of the lower classes for centuries. From medieval serfdom to the industrial working poor, poverty remained a persistent challenge despite evolving systems of welfare and reform.
Medieval and Early Modern Periods During the medieval period, poverty was often viewed through a religious and moral lens. Many poor people lived under feudal obligations, where subsistence living was the norm. The Church and local communities provided charity, but assistance was inconsistent and informal. The dissolution of the monasteries (1536–1541) under Henry VIII removed a key source of charitable relief, contributing to increased visible poverty and vagrancy.
In response, the Tudor state introduced laws to control and assist the poor. The Elizabethan Poor Law of 1601 formalised local responsibility for the destitute, distinguishing between the "deserving" and "undeserving" poor. This system placed the burden of care on parishes, supported by local taxes known as poor rates.
Industrial Revolution and 19th Century The Industrial Revolution (late 18th to early 19th century) transformed the UK economy, but it also exacerbated poverty. Rapid urbanisation led to overcrowded slums, unsanitary living conditions, and insecure employment. Wages for factory and agricultural workers were often low, and child labour was widespread.
The Poor Law Amendment Act of 1834 marked a significant shift, aiming to reduce costs and discourage reliance on relief. It introduced the workhouse system, where conditions were deliberately harsh to deter applicants. This approach drew criticism for its cruelty, especially during times of economic downturn.
Throughout the 19th century, poverty was also addressed by philanthropic initiatives and the rise of reform movements. Campaigns for public health, housing reform, and education reflected growing concern about urban poverty. The later part of the century saw incremental state intervention, such as the Factory Acts, which improved labour conditions, and the Education Act 1870, which began to address child illiteracy.
Early 20th Century to 1950 By the early 20th century, the limitations of the Poor Law system were increasingly evident. Reports like Charles Booth's surveys in London and Seebohm Rowntree's studies in York revealed widespread poverty even among those in employment, challenging the belief that poverty was solely due to individual failure.
The Liberal welfare reforms (1906–1914) introduced measures such as old-age pensions, labour exchanges, and national insurance for sickness and unemployment. These were early steps toward a modern welfare state.
The interwar years (1918–1939) saw rising unemployment, particularly in industrial regions, due to economic instability and the Great Depression. The Means Test, introduced during this time, became a symbol of state intrusion and was widely resented by the poor.
World War II brought new levels of state involvement in welfare, with rationing, evacuation, and employment controls helping reduce some aspects of poverty. The war also laid the groundwork for post-war reforms.
By 1950, the UK had begun implementing the Beveridge Report's recommendations, leading to the creation of the National Health Service (1948) and a more comprehensive social security system, effectively ending the era of the Poor Law and fundamentally changing how poverty was addressed.
1950s and 1960s In the early-1950s, it was believed by numerous people that poverty had been all but abolished from Britain, with only a few isolated pockets of deprivation still remaining.Social Services: Made Simple (1990) by Tony Byrne, BA, BSc(Econ.), and Colin F. Padfield, LLB, DPA(Lond) Much of this assumption was derived from a 1951 study which showed that in 1950 only 1.5% of the survey population lived in poverty, compared with 18% in 1936 when a previous study had been conducted in York Joseph Rowntree Charitable Trust. A leader in The Times spoke positively of this 'remarkable improvement – no less than the virtual abolition of the sheerest want.'
Over the course of the 1950s and 1960s, however, a "rediscovery" of poverty took place, with various surveys showing that a substantial proportion of Britons was impoverished, with between 4–12% of the population estimated to be living below the Supplementary Benefits' scales. In 1969, Professor A. Atkinson stated that
According to this definition, 2–5 million Britons were trapped in poverty. In addition, some 2.6 million people were in receipt of Supplementary Benefits and therefore living on the poverty line. This meant that at least 10% of the population were in poverty at this time. Bad housing conditions also constituted a major cause of poverty in the post-war era. In the early-1960s, it was estimated that three million families lived in "slums, near slums on grossly overcrowded conditions", while a 1967 housing survey of England and Wales found that 11.7% of all dwellings were unfit.Labour and inequality: sixteen fabian essays (1966) edited by Peter Townsend and Nicholas Bosanquet
In their 1965 study on poverty, "The Poor and the Poorest," Professors Peter Townsend and Brian Abel-Smith decided to measure poverty on the basis of the National Assistance levels of living and estimated that some 14% (around 7.5 million) of Britons lived in poverty. Townsend and Abel-Smith also estimated that since the mid-1950s the percentage of the population living in poverty had risen from 8–14%.Speak for Britain! A New History of the Labour Party by Martin Pugh
Differences in health between the classes The continued existence of poverty in the 1960s was also characterised by differences in health between different social classes. In 1964–65, the incidence of infant deaths was more than half as much higher in the two lowest social classes than in the two highest social classes. In 1961–62, 28% of all men recorded at least one spell of sickness of four days or more. For the lowest social classes, however, 35% of men had experienced this, compared with 18% of men in the highest social classes. There is evidence that in large families the height of children was less than that for the average, while families with three or more children were more likely to be inadequately nourished.Socially Deprived Families in Britain edited by Robert Holman, reprinted edition 1971, first published in 1970
1970s and 1980s
In his 1979 work "Poverty in the UK", Townsend suggested that 15 million people lived in or on the margins of poverty. He also argued that to get a proper measure of relative deprivation, there was a need to take into account other factors apart from income measures such as peoples' environment, employment, and housing standards.
According to one study, in 1966, 365,000 families in Great Britain were in poverty by an old assistance standard; and 450,000 families by a new standard. In another study on poverty, Wilfred Beckerman estimated that 9.9% of the British population lived below a standardised poverty line in 1973, compared with 6.1% of the population of Belgium.Responses to poverty: lessons from Europe by Robert Walker, Roger Lawson, and Peter Townsend
Low pay was also a major cause of poverty, with a report by the TUC in 1968 finding that about 5 million females and about 2.5 million males earned less than £15 a week (equivalent to £219.64 in 2024). According to one study, around 20-23% of employees in the late-1960s had low hourly wages. A New Earnings Survey for 1971 found that in April 1971 the average weekly earnings of male manual workers stood at £29.40 and those of female manual workers £15.30, but there were 3.4 million women and 1.2 million men earning less than £20 a week at that time.The year book of social policy in Britain 1971 edited by Kathleen Jones, First published 1972 by Routledge & Kegan Paul 1972, P.164 In 1974, one-quarter of adult employees in Britain earned less than £27 a week or less before tax, only slightly above the officially defined poverty line for an average family.
Regional differences in pay also remained pronounced during the post-war period. Slum housing also remained a problem, with 12% of British households living in houses or flats considered to be unfit for human habitation in 1972. In 1975, government statistics estimated that 1,800,000 children lived in poverty. Nevertheless, the number of people estimated to be living in poor housing conditions was lower at the start of the 1970s than at the start of the 1960s. In 1961, 4,700,000 households lived in unfit or substandard homes, compared with 2,846,000 in 1971.
During the late-1960s and throughout the 1970s, progress was made in reducing the level of post-war poverty and inequality,Childhood poverty and social exclusion: from a child's perspective by Tess Ridge with 3 million families in Britain in poverty in 1977, compared with 5 million in 1961. According to the 1971 Supplementary Benefits scale, the percentage of individuals living in poverty fell from 9.4% in 1963 to 2.3% in 1973. Low pay continued to remain a major problem by the end of the 1970s, however, particularly amongst manual workers.
Based on various measurements, however, the number of Britons living in poverty rose significantly from 1979-85. The number of Britons living in poverty (when defined as living below the Supplementary Benefit level) rose from 2,090,000 to 2,420,000 during that period, whilst the number of people living in poverty when defined as living on or below the Supplementary Benefit level rose from 6,070,000 to 9,380,000. Using a poverty measurement of living at 140% of the Supplementary Benefit level or below, the rise was from 11,570,000 to 15,420,000.
From 1979–87, the number of Britons living in poverty (defined as living on less than half the national average income) doubled, from roughly 10% to 20% of the whole population. In 1989, almost 6 million full-time workers, representing 37% of the total full-time workforce, earned less than the "decency threshold" defined by the Council of Europe as 68% of average full-time earnings. In 1994, 76.7% of all part-time workers earned less than this threshold.
Comparison with the rest of Europe