Ahead of today's debate on #UniversalCredit, a reminder of what happened to benefit levels in the 5 years prior to the pandemic: the proportion of a single adult’s core benefit income required to cover a basic minimum food budget increased by 9 percentage points, to 68%. [1/3]
Looking across all single-adult households, it is the poorest who suffered the largest increase, of 3.8 percentage points, in the cost of a basic minimum food budget as a proportion of their overall income. The mean population increase was less than one sixth of this figure [2/3]
Meanwhile, amongst couples with two children, it is the very poorest group who suffered an increase while all others saw a decrease. Indeed, living in poverty often results in families having to buy goods and services through the most expensive means [3/3]
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