wulbert
pfm Member
Some staggering findings in this analysis of the Sunday Times Rich List. Surely this can't go on without grave societal consequences? (Shared under Creative Commons license)
Policy Brief
The good life at the top
Analysing The Sunday Times Rich List 1989-2023
Ben Tippet* and Rafael Wildauer* *University of Greenwich
Key Findings
Policy Brief
The good life at the top
Analysing The Sunday Times Rich List 1989-2023
Ben Tippet* and Rafael Wildauer* *University of Greenwich
Key Findings
- Wealth in the UK in 2023 is extremely concentrated: the richest 50 families in the UK have more wealth than the bottom half of the UK population (33.5 million people): both groups own £466 billion.
- Since the first rich list was published in 1989, wealth inequality has been on the rise: in 1989 a rich person had 6000 times the average person. Today it is 18,000 times.
- COVID-19 and the cost-of-living crisis has not stopped rising wealth inequality: since the beginning of Covid-19, the wealthiest 200 families have seen their wealth increase in real terms by 22%. This increase alone is enough to give every family in the UK £9000.
- While the super-rich of the STRL have never been wealthier, the UK government is poorer than at any time over the last 30 years. Privatisation, lowrelatively low public investment spending and financial sector and COVID-19 bailouts have pushed the UK government’s liabilities to exceed its assets by £1.25 trillion in 2023.
- Wealth inequality is likely to continue to grow into the future if nothing is done: if we continue at the current rates, the wealth of the richest 200 families will be larger than whole UK economy (GDP) by 2035.1
- An increasingly popular solution is to raise taxes on the wealthy: taxing just half of the increase in the wealth of the richest 50 families each year would raise enough to give all public sector workers (5.5 million people) a standard of living preserving pay rise of 10.5%.