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The poverty of older people in the UK
- Author:
- PRICE Debora
- Journal article citation:
- Journal of Social Work Practice, 20(3), November 2006, pp.251-266.
- Publisher:
- Taylor and Francis
- Place of publication:
- Philadelphia, USA
The quality of life of older people is markedly affected by their material resources and experience of income poverty. In 1997, almost a third of those past state pension age in the UK lived in poverty. Changes to benefits and payments to older people since the advent of a Labour government have on some measures reduced these poverty rates significantly. This article critically examines this claim, posing three substantive questions: what do these measurements of poverty rates among older people mean, who are the disadvantaged in old age, and what might the future of poverty in old age look like? Poverty rates are extremely sensitive to the measures used, and particular problems for older people such as depth of poverty and persistent poverty are disguised by headcount poverty rates. Among older people, gender, social class, age and marital status are important determinants of poverty. Following the Pensions Commission's report in November 2005, the government will introduce pension reforms that will have some impact on pensioner poverty decades in the future, but will have almost no impact on current pensioners, and little impact on those who will shortly become pensioners. It is argued that older people are institutionally marginalised in these reforms. Material disadvantage accumulates not only through socio-economic correlates and life events, but also because of age, generation and cohort.
How important are state transfers for reducing poverty rates in later life?
- Authors:
- PRICE Debora, et al
- Journal article citation:
- Ageing and Society, 36(9), 2016, pp.1794-1825.
- Publisher:
- Cambridge University Press
Financial welfare in later life is of prime concern as the funding of pensions and care rises up policy agendas. In this context, work and family histories are well known to impact on late-life income, generally reducing state and private pensions for women. In a political context where benefits are under threat as part of the retrenchment of the welfare state, the authors consider two key questions. First, how do state pension and benefit transfers interact with work and family histories to reduce poverty risks in later life? Second, who is kept out of poverty by state benefits and transfers? Using data from the English Longitudinal Study of Ageing, the authors examine how work, family and health histories are associated with poverty in later life and estimate how far and in what ways state pensions, income support and disability benefits play a mediating role. It is concluded that state support is key to maintaining incomes above official poverty lines for substantial numbers whose work, family and health histories would otherwise have led to their incomes falling below these lines. While disability benefits are designed to compensate for the additional costs of disability, it is likely that many in receipt experience poverty (even though they are not captured in official poverty statistics); even more so for those incurring the costs of disability but not in receipt of these benefits. (Edited publisher abstract)