{"id":42966,"date":"2024-01-19T14:55:00","date_gmt":"2024-01-19T14:55:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.pantheregroup.com\/2024\/01\/19\/u-k-getting-poorer-and-sicker-as-illness-keeps-people-out-of-work\/"},"modified":"2024-01-19T14:55:00","modified_gmt":"2024-01-19T14:55:00","slug":"u-k-getting-poorer-and-sicker-as-illness-keeps-people-out-of-work","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.pantheregroup.com\/2024\/01\/19\/u-k-getting-poorer-and-sicker-as-illness-keeps-people-out-of-work\/","title":{"rendered":"U.K. getting ‘poorer and sicker’ as illness keeps people out of work"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Escalating levels of illness and health-related economic inactivity are worsening inequality in the United Kingdom and pose a \u201cprofound fiscal threat,\u201d according to new research.<\/p>\n
Work by the cross-party IPPR Commission on Health and Prosperity found that one in every four working-age Britons who neither have nor want a job live in just 50 local authorities.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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The findings published Jan. 18 highlight a \u201cdouble injustice,\u201d with people living in the most deprived areas \u201cone and a half times more likely to experience economic inactivity and twice as likely to be in poor health,\u201d IPPR said.<\/p>\n
Illness is linked to low productivity, high poverty and persistent unemployment. The wealth divide has left \u201cbad health black spots\u201d across the U.K. where people are more likely to be out of work.<\/p>\n
Figures from the Office for National Statistics show that inactivity among 16 to 64-year-olds stood at almost 8.7 million toward the end of 2023, or more than one in five. Hundreds of thousands have dropped out of work since the pandemic, driven by a surge in long-term sickness.<\/p>\n<\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/source><\/picture><\/figure>\n
The government\u2019s forecaster, the Office for Budget Responsibility, has warned that the number of people moving into inactivity and onto benefits is becoming unaffordably expensive.<\/p>\n
Rising economic inactivity deprives the country of growth potential and adds tens of billions of pounds to the welfare bill, the OBR has said. IPPR reiterated the warning, saying health-related inactivity \u201cis one of the most profound fiscal threats faced by the U.K.\u201d and is damaging to the country economically.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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Poor health leaves the worst-affected areas trapped it a cycle of deprivation as high inactivity leads to low productivity, higher unemployment, more child poverty and smaller household incomes.<\/p>\n
\u201cInactivity is closely correlated with the level of poor health in each place. A one per cent increase in the number of people reporting bad or very bad health is associated with a 2.1 per cent increase in the proportion of working-age people who are economically inactive,\u201d the report said.<\/p>\n
People in Liverpool are almost three times more likely to be in poor health than those in Oxfordshire and twice as likely to be economically inactive.<\/p>\n\n