JRF poverty report
The Joseph Rowntree Foundation has reported that the risk of poverty has risen for workers in families with children
The risk of poverty has risen for workers in families with children, according to the Quaker-founded Joseph Rowntree Foundation (JRF).
The annual report on UK poverty published on 7 February showed that, despite rising paid employment, about fifty-six per cent of people living in poverty now are also in a working household. This compares to thirty-nine per cent twenty years ago.
In-work poverty has risen from 9.9 per cent of workers in 1997/98 to 12.7 per cent now. Single parent families have been the worst hit, it said, with seven in ten children in poverty now in a working family and working single parents accounting for three in ten households in poverty in 2019, compared with two in ten in 2011.
According to JRF, universal credit has not helped many low-income families because it required upfront payments for childcare before households were able to access state support. The report describes in-work poverty as a ‘critical issue for our economy’ and says that ‘The whole of society, including central, devolved and local government, employers and civil society must all work together.’
