Financial wellbeing improved only 0.2% in five years
31/03/2015
Official figures from the Office of National Statistics (ONS) have shown that the financial wellbeing of households has only improved by 0.2% in the last five years.
The Real Household Disposable Income (RHDI) is a measure that records household income after tax and is adjusted for inflation.The RHDI did increase by 1.9% per head in December 2014, but the measure is only 0.2% higher than it was in the second quarter of 2010.
The ONS has also reported that the number of people who thought their financial situation was getting worse outweighs the number seeing an improvement. The balance of perceptions is -5.2, an improvement on last year when the figure stood at -7.6. Household spending has also risen by 0.3% in the year to December 2014.
It seems to be that the UK is starting to recover from the aftermath of the recession. This will be an important factor in the upcoming 2015 general election. The Conservatives have praised these figures as proof that their economic strategy is working.
Labour has claimed that working families are "struggling" as incomes are squeezed. Ed Balls, the shadow Chancellor, said that the Conservatives were "telling people you have never had it so good" despite it being the "slowest recovery for 100 years".
"This is a government which has presided over five years when wages have not kept pace with rising prices and family bills," he said.
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