New analysis shows growing proportion of UK population (36.6%) would be unable to afford an unexpected bill
Almost 30% of people in the UK are unable to afford even a week's annual holiday, up from less than a quarter before the financial crisis, according to a new analysis by the Office for National Statistics which reveals the day-to-day struggle facing many families in post-recession Britain.
The finding is part of a wider report comparing levels of poverty and social exclusion across the UK and the rest of the European Union. More than a fifth of the population – 22.7%, or 14 million people – were considered "at risk of poverty or social exclusion" in 2011, the latest year for which data are available.
This level has been largely unchanged since 2007, and compares to an EU average of 24.1% – though that includes countries such as Greece and Spain which are in deep financial and economic crisis.
The proportion of the population in the UK defined as "at risk of poverty," has fallen since the depths of the recession, the ONS reports, from 18.7% in 2008 to 16.2% in 2011 – but that is partly because the definition of the poverty line, which is calculated relative to average incomes, has declined, as real wages across the economy have fallen.
The ONS therefore uses a series of measures of "material deprivation" to give a clearer picture of how living standards have been affected by the economic downturn.
These show that more than a third of people (36.6%) say they would be unable to afford an "unexpected but necessary financial expense", such as a surprise bill, up from 26.6% in 2007, suggesting that a growing number of households are struggling to make ends meet.
There have also been modest increases in the percentage of people saying they struggled to pay their mortgage, rent, utility bills or heating.
The proportion of people in "severe material deprivation", defined as being unable to afford four or more from a list of items, including a washing machine and a telephone, has remained largely flat since 2005, and stood at 5.1% in 2011, the ONS said.
But statisticians also pointed out the higher-than-average level of people in the UK living in a household where there is so-called "low work intensity": where the adults in the household were employed at just 20% or less of their full capacity – in other words, where they were unemployed, or working very few hours.
In 2011, 11.5% of people in Britain lived in a household with very low work intensity. That was down from 13.1% in 2010, but was the seventh highest level among the 26 European countries compared by the ONS. The average across the EU is 10%.
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