Inequality

A common measure that economists use to measure inequality is the Gini index. This measures inequality on a scale from 0 (where everyone has the same amount) to 100 (where one person has it all).

In the chart, you can see the Gini index in the UK since the 1960s.

Income inequality in the UK rose sharply in the 1980s, from 25 in 1979 to 35 in 1990, one of the biggest increases among rich countries. Since then, it has remained at a similar level.

Over the long run, the share of income going to the richest has followed a U-shape.

Before the First World War, the richest 1% of adults received around 27% of all pre-tax income. That share fell sharply over the following six decades, to a low of under 7% in 1978, as wars, the Depression, higher taxes and the growth of wages narrowed the gap.

Since 1980, the share of the richest 1% has nearly doubled, from 7.4% to 13.6% in 2025, though it has changed little since the financial crisis. The richest 10% receive 36% of pre-tax income, and the poorest half receive 21%.

Taxes and benefits reduce income inequality substantially. In 2025, the Gini coefficient of income from work, private pensions and investments was 47. Cash benefits, such as the State Pension and Universal Credit, brought it down to 37, and direct taxes, such as income tax, to 33.

The same is true at the top. In 2024, the richest 1% received 13.6% of pre-tax income, but 9.3% of income after taxes and benefits. The richest 10% received 36% before tax and 28% after.

Incomes are more equal in Scotland and Northern Ireland than in the UK as a whole.

In recent years, the Gini coefficient of household income before housing costs was 30 in Scotland, compared with 33 across the UK. In Northern Ireland, it was 25.

One reason why is that the UK figure includes London and the South East of England, where the highest incomes are concentrated.

The Welsh Government doesn't publish an official measure of income inequality for Wales.

Wealth is much more unequally distributed than income. Before the First World War, the richest 1% of adults owned around two-thirds of all personal wealth in the UK, and the richest 10% owned almost all of it.

Their shares fell dramatically over the 20th century. By the 1980s, the richest 1% owned around 18%. Their share has risen slightly since, to 21% in 2024, while the poorest half of adults own less than 5%.

According to the Wealth and Assets Survey, the wealthiest 10% of households in Great Britain owned 41% of all household wealth in April 2020 to March 2022, while the least wealthy half owned 10%.

Financial wealth, such as savings and shares, is the most unequally distributed type of wealth, with a Gini coefficient of 0.87, followed by private pensions (0.68) and property (0.66).

Total household wealth in Great Britain was £13.6 trillion in April 2020 to March 2022. But what was this composed of?

Property and houses made up the largest share, at 40% of it. Private pensions were close behind, at 35%. Financial wealth was 14%, and physical wealth, such as cars and household contents, 10%.

The wealthiest tenth of households owned £5.5 trillion, about one and a half times as much as the least wealthy 70%. Financial assets, such as shares and savings, make up a bigger part of the wealthiest tenth's wealth (19%) than of middle households' (7%), whose wealth is mostly property, pensions and possessions.

How do incomes compare across generations?

Here, the most relevant measure is what different generations were earning at a given age (for example, 30-year-olds). You can see this data in the chart, where one line represents people born in a given decade.

For most of the last 50 years, each generation has had higher incomes than the one before at the same age. At age 30, people born in the 1960s had median household incomes 30% higher than those born in the 1950s, and those born in the 1970s had 27% higher incomes than those born in the 1960s.

But these gains have slowed: those born in the 1980s had incomes just 5% higher than those born in the 1970s.

The same slowdown shows at age 25: people born in the 1990s had incomes just 4% higher than those born in the 1980s at the same age.

You can compare different measures of inequality across countries using the dropdown option in the chart.

On a harmonised measure of income after taxes and benefits, the UK's Gini coefficient has been around 30 to 32 in recent years. That makes it more equal than the United States (39), similar to France, Germany and Canada (30 to 31), and more unequal than the Nordic countries, Belgium and the Netherlands (24 to 29).

In 2025, the UK's richest 1% received 13.6% of pre-tax income: a little more than in France (12.4%) and Germany (12.2%), but much less than in the United States (21%).

The UK's wealth is less concentrated at the very top than in most other high-income countries: the richest 1% own 21% of wealth, compared with 28% in France and Germany and 35% in the United States.

The Gini coefficient summarises how unequal a distribution is, on a scale from 0 (everyone has the same) to 100 (one person has everything). ONS and DWP measure it for household income adjusted for household size ("equivalised"), so that a couple and a single person with the same income per person count as equally well-off. Ratios such as the Palma ratio compare the total income of groups at the top and bottom.

Household income comes from surveys: ONS's Living Costs and Food Survey and Household Finances Survey, and DWP's Family Resources Survey. Disposable income is income from all sources, including benefits, after direct taxes. Surveys tend to miss the very richest, so ONS adjusts the top of the distribution using tax records. Figures before housing costs are used here; inequality is higher after housing costs, because the poorest spend more of their income on rent.

Top income and wealth shares come from the World Inequality Database, which combines tax records, surveys and national accounts. Its income measure covers all national income, including profits that companies keep, and its estimates are per adult. Its figures for the early 20th century rely mainly on income tax and estate tax records, and are less certain.

Household wealth comes from ONS's Wealth and Assets Survey, which covers Great Britain and asks about property, pensions, savings, debts and possessions. It doesn't include the value of the State Pension. The most recent survey covers April 2020 to March 2022.

Income across generations comes from ONS's analysis of household surveys from 1977 to 2017/18, which groups people by their decade of birth. Incomes are adjusted for inflation and household size, and are for the household of the household reference person (usually the person with the highest income).

International comparisons of income inequality come from the Luxembourg Income Study, which harmonises national household surveys, and comparisons of top shares from the World Inequality Database, both via Our World in Data.