Population in Poverty
Around 2.2 million Londoners (24 per cent) were in relative poverty after taking housing costs into account in 2020/21-2022/23*. This has fallen since the run-up to the pandemic from 2.4 million Londoners (27 per cent) living in relative poverty. While poverty in London has decreased in recent years, this has meant that it is no longer the region with the highest proportion of residents in poverty. In the latest estimates, 27 per cent of West Midlands residents were estimated to be in poverty while 25 per cent of North West residents were. However, issues with carrying out surveys during the pandemic and reduced response rates since March 2020 mean there is increased uncertainty in the figures.
Children are most likely to be living below the poverty line, though this has fallen to 32 per cent of London’s children in low income households in the latest estimates, while the proportion of London’s pension-aged population living in poverty is slightly lower than the rate among working-age Londoners in the latest figures. Despite the cost of living crisis exerting a major influence on family finances during 2022/23, the estimates for all age groups have remained largely the same in the latest figures, for 2020/21-2022/23*, though the poverty rate among pensioners has fallen recently to levels similar to the start of the 2010s. Relative poverty is an important measure of inequality, but is not the only one.