Read the news, full of the latest murders and political drama, and it’s easy to be depressed about the state of the world (to say nothing of hysterical social media). But it’s just possible that this isn’t a complete picture of trends in the UK…
There is certainly much the UK should do (or is doing) to improve the pace of growth, fix public services and tackle poverty. The world is rapidly warming, and I remain horrified about the industrial torture of farmed animals. Global conflict has risen, and Trump can no doubt inflict more economic and geopolitical chaos. But with those acknowledgements laid out, I worry that UK opinion is now too gloomy. This is not a country where everything has gone wrong, nothing works and where we must strive to return to our glory days. In very many ways, life in the UK is historically good:
1. Average ‘real household disposable income‘ per person is perhaps the best measure available of money-based living standards overall (one of the Government’s goals is to increase it). The latest year of data (up to Q2 2025) shows the joint-highest income ever (matching the year to Q3 2021). Economists like me can and do complain that the pace of growth isn’t as fast as we’d like, but people should also understand the more basic point that we are much richer than in the past – despite the shocks of the financial crisis, Brexit, Covid and Russia-driven inflation.
And internationally, the only countries that are richer than the UK in terms of GDP per capita and as big as the UK (in population or total GDP) are Germany and the US – with France very similar in prosperity and population. (And among the differing current problems facing each of those four nations, I think the UK’s might be the most fixable.)
2. Does that mask a big rise in inequality over the past decade or two? No – at worst you could say that household income inequality has stayed stubbornly high on some measures (and on other measures it has been falling). I’ve written about the very poorest falling behind, but big welfare boosts in 2026 should make a significant difference to that. Employee pay has become significantly more equal, with the lowest earners having the strongest pay growth over the past decade or so – clearly outpacing inflation. The gender pay gap has continued to hit record lows. And for around half of workers (and clear majorities of higher earners), the rise of working from home has brought monetary and non-monetary benefits that are not captured in any of these real income or earnings numbers.
3. Despite years of negative headlines about the labour market, the UK’s (16-64) employment rate is higher than it’s ever been except for 2018-2019. Similarly, the 16-64 inactivity rate is at a near record-low, and the share of young people out of work or education – while higher than we should want – is not unusual. Part of the reason for the post-2020 inactivity narrative was simply incorrect Labour Force Survey data. There is a justified worry about rising ‘long-term sickness’ and of PIP receipt, but that has been offset by other forms of ‘inactivity’ declining. There are problems to grapple with, but it’s not true that the UK overall has some historically- or internationally-unusual inactivity problem.
4. Government borrowing is coming down. As the chart below shows, at some point in 2027 or 2028 tax receipts might start to exceed day-to-day spending (or, alternatively, spending excluding interest). Outside of a tiny surplus in 2018, that would be the best borrowing position since the early 2000s, while still allowing investment. Similarly, net liabilities are also projected to peak within the next few years and then start falling. It’s true that these are just forecasts, and that the Government’s fiscal rules don’t require it to deliver these near-term outcomes, but if the economy performs similar to expectations then it is a very real possibility. Why should anyone care? One benefit is lower interest costs, both mechanically and from greater confidence by lenders (particularly if inflation also comes down soon as expected). But in the spirit of my title, I think it shows the UK is already a relatively serious country with clear plans, and soon we may be in a clearly better position than the US or France, for example. And more broadly there’s a point that one reason why things may feel squeezed is that the UK is actually making sacrifices to invest in the future: turning around the debt trajectory; increasing investment such as in water infrastructure; and building electric infrastructure that will bring big benefits in time but for now requires investment (while dual-running the legacy fossil fuel system and all its infrastructure).
5. The home ownership rate has been rising, and is not bad. I have highlighted before that the UK has the most expensive quality-adjusted housing in the OECD, and totally support the thesis that we have a shortfall of several million homes and need to do more to build 300,000 homes a year. As well as making the country poorer, the status quo makes the luck of inheritances (and coupling) too important. But people are still buying homes to live in: they are evidently not ‘unaffordable‘. The official English home ownership rate in 2023 was 65%, up from 63% in 2016; similar to the US rate and higher than in most rich rich countries; and – in the grand scheme of things – not so different from the 71% all-time-peak of 2003 (particularly factoring in trends such as a greater share of people who’ve only recently moved to the UK). Rates have also risen for young adults, while the importance of the private rented sector has fallen since 2016. It’s true there’s been a shift in the age that people become homeowners, but I think we can be more optimistic now than we were a decade ago that millennials and other cohorts will end up in the same 65-75% (family unit) home ownership rate landing zone as every other post-war generation. Meanwhile, outright ownership rates have never been higher. The cost of rent or mortgage interest compared to household incomes is in line with where it was in the 1990s and 2000s. And far fewer people are now living in ‘non-decent‘ housing. Again, I think housing is an area where we could achieve much better outcomes, and it has been harder for recent generations to become homeowners, but many people will be over-estimating how much the housing market has changed – or even getting the last decade’s direction of travel wrong.
6. Crime is historically low. The number of incidents in crime survey data (let alone adjusted for population) is lower that at any time since the series began in 1981, with particularly low levels of violence, theft and criminal damage. Looking at the most certain and severe indicator, the homicide rate in 2023-24 was lower than at any point in the 80s, 90s or 00s. The rate was lower in the 1950s, but that was a time when the adult population was disproportionately female, children made up a greater share of the population, and – dispelling any idea of a peaceful land – domestic violence was shockingly normal. And while some American commentators love to highlight any news of violence in Britain, the two countries are in totally different leagues. Even the crime-ridden hellhole that is London [editor: please check] has a lower homicide rate than the safest US state (leafy New Hampshire). With less miserly public spending plus new technologies and demographic tailwinds, the UK can surely reduce crime further, but we need to look to stats rather than the vibes from the day’s headlines to assess the safety of a country of 70 million people.
7. Life expectancy is higher than ever. It fell during Covid, but mortality rates for 2024 (below) suggest period life expectancy should have hit a record high in 2024. And while life expectancy is around 2 years lower than in France, we have consistently matched Germany since the 1990s, kept a stable gap with Japan, and now live 2 years longer than Americans. As with income growth rates, we should aim to raise the pace of improvement again, but shouldn’t be too ungrateful about living 9 years longer than Brits 50 years ago.
8. Our air quality is better than ever (and there are clear next steps to go further, re. EVs, tyres, brakes, burning wood and gas, and agriculture). This is not a high-profile issue but is perhaps an example of many areas of UK life that have steadily and quietly improved. I didn’t know until wondering about it as part of this paragraph that pre-school asthma rates declined by 65% between 2008 and 2018.
9. Greenhouse gas emissions continue to fall. The UK has set out clear targets, institutions and mechanisms and it is continuing to hit those targets and drive innovation (even if we could do more on aviation and agriculture especially). And while the UK is not the world, the peak for global CO2 emissions (and Chinese emissions) may well have been 2024, and the peak for all greenhouse gas emissions may be in the next few years – landmarks that should be cause for celebration whenever confirmed.
10. The UK is the 3rd happiest country in the G7 – happier than France and fractionally above the US. We are the 23rd happiest country in the world. And we are 7th in the world – and top of the G7 – for happiness-equality (i.e. a tighter spread of scores across the population). Various data does suggest we were slightly less happy in 2024 than we were in 2016-2019, but our international position is essentially unchanged, while looking longer-term it appears that British life satisfaction steadily improved over the 2000s and 2010s to levels unseen over 1975-2000: the past was not a happier country.
That is deliberately a one-sided list of good news to help offset excessive gloominess. But it is all true and likely a much fairer picture than you’d get from browsing the news or social feeds. Our country can and should be improved, but it is not broken.