Peter Matejic

A chart showing how regular wages are growing before taking account of inflation. Between Sept and March, the series starting in Sept 2023 and in Sept 2024 show very similar profile growing around 2% over those six months. In the next four months, the 2024-25 series grew more slowly, such that there was around a 1 percentage point gap in nominal growth by July, with the nominal wage growth between Sept 2023 and July 2024 being around 5% but between Sept 2024 and July 2025 being around 4%.

Great question. Answer is a bit of both, but higher inflation is the biggest driver, with similar (if lower) nominal wage growth this year compared to last year.

Unless we get strong growth in one of the next two months' data, annual earnings growth will fall to ~zero in data out on 11th Nov, before Budget, highlighting the importance of decisions there.

A chart showing how regular wages are growing after taking account of inflation. The first few months of the period starting September 2023 showed relatively slow growth, but there was consistent growth between February 2024 and September 2024, meaning wages grew by 2.4% over the year. This latter period is in contrast to the period starting September 2024, where growth has hovered around zero. Between September 2023 and July 2024, wages grew 2.1%, but in the same period a year later, they grew just 0.1%.

Near zero real earnings growth since Sept, 10th month in row. We had a very small fall in earnings in July 2025 on previous month, leaving earnings up just 0.1% on Sept 2024.

It's been too long since we have had a housing-related thread from @jelliott94.bsky.social - now rectified! A good reminder tax changes influence behaviours (for good or ill) as well as affecting revenue.

Thanks to @crsp-uk.bsky.social for their hard work on this report, which unfortunately shows benefits fall woefully short of MIS and even families in work earning the National Living Wage often falling short of the relevant standard.

Without the security of affordable housing, a stable job & adequate social security, it's hard to take risks, invest in your future or be productive at work. Rising living standards aren’t just a desirable by-product of growth, they're an essential ingredient to a strong economy.

A growing economy is good news, and today's growth figures are actually better than expected, even if below the average since 2000. More broadly, the government is running out of time to put direct support for living standards at the heart of its strategy for growth.

Thanks for picking this up. It's based on series A2FC in tab '6. Real AWE' in the spreadsheet at www.ons.gov.uk/employmentan.... We've waited a few months to be sure it's not a blip, but the earnings slowdown (mainly due to higher inflation) feels a real effect to us.

A very small fall in earnings in June 2025 on previous month - now just 0.2% up on Sept 2024, around an eighth of the growth in the same period last year.

We now have the new MPR. It implies annual private sector wage growth of ~zero by Sept 25 compared to CPIH and ~zero by Dec 25 compared to CPI (and falling relative to CPIH). Not a good earnings backdrop to the Budget.

When coupled with above target rate inflation, falling vacancy numbers and rising unemployment, it how much shows the Chancellor needs to focus on tackling falling living standards there. See jrf.org.uk/news/new-jrf... our previous analysis. (5/5)

Lack of earnings growth is deeply worrying and should trends continue and the budget be after 11 November (when September earnings data comes out), the latest picture may well show no earnings growth in the latest year. (4/5)

What did the May Monetary Policy Report say? The Bank doesn’t look at whole economy regular wages or CPIH inflation, and were too high on private sector earnings and too low on CPI inflation. They had both series falling over the next six months. (3/5)

Latest annual figures are flattered by positive earnings growth between May and September 2024. Why this stagnation? It’s due to higher inflation since September 2024, with non-inflation adjusted (nominal) earnings growth very similar over both periods. (2/5)

A chart showing how regular wages are growing after taking account of inflation. The first few months of the period starting September 2023 showed relatively slow growth, but there was consistent growth between February 2024 and September 2024, meaning wages grew by 2.4% over the year. This latter period is in contrast to the period starting September 2024, where growth has hovered around zero. Between September 2023 and May 2024, wages grew 1.8%, but in the same period a year later, they grew just 0.3%.

Ahead of tomorrow’s Monetary Policy Report, look at how real earnings have stagnated since September. They’re up just 0.3% between September 2024 and the latest May 2025 data, just a fifth of the growth over the same period in 2023-24. (1/5)

Anyway, thanks for engaging with the report and material even if you remain a sceptic.

Thanks, I do think sequences of groups, each building on previous ones make it more objective. And I do think that thinking of what is needed for sufficiency rather than what people are having to go without is a good question. But we do have a range of data to look at, all with their pros and cons.

A Minimum Income Standard for the United Kingdom in 2024 The Minimum Income Standard provides a vision of the living standards that we, as a society, agree everyone in the UK should be able to achieve. This report sets out what households need to reach it i...

See www.jrf.org.uk/a-minimum-in... for the methodology (used consistently since 2008). You'll see from www.lboro.ac.uk/research/crs..., separate MIS's for London & for rural Scotland has been constructed. I do think a good way of determining a decent living standard is to ask people what they need.

Starmer's missed milestone? The outlook for living standards at the Spring Statement While on average all families are forecast to see a fall in living standards this Government, families on the lowest incomes are set to bear the brunt of the pain.

Thanks. This isn't the first way we would recommend raising tax revenue. We'd first look at Capital Gains Tax and National Insurance Contributions on investment income which improve the fairness and efficiency of the tax system and raise revenue. See www.jrf.org.uk/cost-of-livi... for our thinking.

Here's a related comment piece from @mattpadley.bsky.social given his insights on pension reform: www.lboro.ac.uk/media-centre...

Pensioner Poverty: challenges and mitigations - Committees - UK Parliament Are pension age benefits and the State Pension enough to stop pensioners from falling into poverty?  We are looking at the state of pensioner poverty in the UK. Which groups are most affected? Wh...

See committees.parliament.uk/work/8675/pe... for the excellent Work and Pension Select Committee report and jrf.org.uk/households-l... for the latest Households Below a Minimum Income Standard report. (4/4)

The report says "a guiding principle should be [State Pension] provides the amount needed for a minimum, dignified, socially acceptable standard of living. The Government should set a strategy to reduce ... the proportion of pensioners living below this level in future." (3/4)

A chart showing the proportion of pensioners falling below the Minimum Income Standard. This was around 13% in the period 2008-11 (around 1 in 8 pensioners), rising to 19% by 2017/18 (close to 1 in 5 pensioners), before falling back to 15% in 2020/21 (around 1 in 6 pensioners). The proportion of pensioners below the standard rose dramatically between then and 2022/23, currently standing at 24% (close to 1 in 4 pensioners).

As I told the committee, the proportion of pensioners not reaching MIS, which sets out what the public agree is needed for a minimum, dignified, socially acceptable standard of living, has actually gone up even faster than the main poverty measure. (2/4)

Delighted to give evidence to Work and Pensions Committee on pensioner poverty. Report says "retirement should be dignified and not a struggle at the poverty line." @jrf-uk.bsky.social and @crsp-uk.bsky.social's Minimum Income Standard measures this. What do the stats show? It's not good news (1/4).

Thanks @bbcnewslive.bsky.social for covering disability cuts (I'm on just after 12.20 at bbc.co.uk/iplayer/live...) I'm proud of everyone's work in getting mitigations for existing recipients, but it's not right support is being cut from future disabled people who will be at high risk of hardship.

Come join @jrf-uk.bsky.social! These are really important roles, helping us to achieve real *positive* change.

How rumoured disability and sickness benefit cuts compare to others since 2010 These rumoured cuts would be the largest in social security for a decade, since George Osborne’s 2015 Budget. They'd be 3 times the size of the (subsequently cancelled) cuts Iain Duncan Smith resigned...

Yes - to sugar-coat massive welfare cuts in that Budget: www.jrf.org.uk/social-secur...

Indeed - huge kudos to @learnworkuk.bsky.social for their great work here.

It shows planned £1.8 billion extra investment in employment support over the next four years could help 45,000-95,000 more disabled people into work. 3.2 million people face benefit cuts, meaning maximum share expected to move into work is 3%

Estimating the impacts of extra employment support for disabled people

NB: this is the paper the stats in my quote comes from: learningandwork.org.uk/resources/re....