Working-age adults

The attainment gap between advantaged and disadvantaged students is lower in Inner London than in Outer London and lower in Outer London than it is in the rest of England. 

In Inner London in 2021/22, 19 year olds who were eligible for Free School Meals at the end of Key Stage 4 were 12.4 percentage points less likely to have gained Level 3 qualifications (equivalent to A levels) than their peers who were not eligible for Free School Meals. In Outer London the figure was 19.5 percentage points and in the rest of England it was 28.1 percentage points.

Looking over the past decade, the attainment gap has remained fairly consistent, with Inner London always having a smaller gap than Outer London or the rest of England. Based on this data alone, the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic has had a negligible impact on the attainment gap.

Although a ma…

Key findings

• Every area has seen an increase in claims
• Average threefold increase
• Significant increase in areas with historically high levels of employment (shown in orange)
• Areas with higher numbers of food service, transportation and hospitality workers hit hard (east Newham, north Brent, south Waltham Forest and south Hillingdon)

Every area has seen an increase in the claimant count, with the average being almost a tripling across the 14 month period. The size of the increase, however, is uneven. While some areas have historically had high unemployment levels, other areas with traditionally high levels of employment have seen substantial increases, well over and above the London average, while others have been less impacted.

The first map above shows the size of the increase in each of London's ~4800 small statistical areas (LSOAs) and whet…

The child dependency ratio in the rest of England is higher compared to Inner London, but lower compared to Outer London.

In 2020, there were 33.9 children for every 100 working-age adults within Outer London. This figure is both higher than the child dependency ratio in Inner London (26.4 children per 100 working-age adults) and the rest of England (30.8 children per 100 working-age adults).

The child dependency ratio is an indication of how many under 16s working-age people need to support. Since 2000, the child dependency ratio has fallen in Inner London and the rest of England but risen in Outer London. Across London and England, the child dependency ratio is projected to decline after 2020.

33% of young people completing KS5 (post-GCSE qualifications) in London in 2020/21 were classed as disadvantaged, compared to 23% in the rest of England.

In London, the most common destination was higher education, with similar numbers of disadvantaged (44%) and non-disadvantaged (49%) students going to university. This is very different from the rest of England, where a lower proportion of people attend higher education overall, and the gap between disadvantaged (22%) and non-disadvantaged (37%) students is much greater. In London, young people are less likely to enter work (12%, compared to 23% in the rest of England) or begin an apprenticeship (3%, compared to 7% in the rest of England).

Pupils are classified as disadvantaged in Year 11 if they are either eligible for free school meals in the last 6 years or were looked after by a local…

This map shows the Employment deprivation domain, one of the domains that forms the Index of Multiple Deprivation for England, 2019. Deciles are with respect to the England-wide data, so, for example, an area in the "most deprived decile" is one of the most deprived 10% of areas across England.

The Employment deprivation domain makes up 22.5% of the overall index. It measures the proportion of the working age population in an area involuntarily excluded from the labour market. This includes people who would like to work but are unable to do so due to unemployment, sickness or disability, or caring responsibilities. Data used to construct this domain includes Claimants of Jobseeker's Allowance, Claimants of Employment and Support Allowance, Claimants of Incapacity Benefit, Claimants of Severe Disablement Allowance, Claimants of Carer's All…

Looking at hours worked within London and the rest of England can give us a useful insight on our working patterns pre- and post-pandemic. Actual hours worked are heavily impacted by external factors, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, whereas usual hours are not expected to change much over the years. 

Actual hours worked varied particularly between 2019 and 2020 for the bottom income quintiles within England. Within London, the decline in actual hours worked for the 2nd income quintile is most extreme between 2019 and 2020 - dropping from 36.8 to 25.6 hours per week. For almost all income quintiles, the amount of actual hours worked has bounced back to pre-pandemic levels as the economy recovers. However, for those in the 2nd income quintile, the amount of hours in 2021 (33.1 hours) are still below pre-pandemic levels in 2019 (36.8 hours).

A…

The benefit cap limits the amount of benefit that most working-age people can receive. In London the limit is £23,000 per year or £15,410 for single adults with no children. This was reduced in 2015. The benefit cap is applied by either reducing Universal Credit or Housing Benefit (for those not claiming Universal Credit).

The benefit cap reduced the benefits of 21,381 more London families in August 2022 compared to August 2019 (pre-pandemic). This means that the number of families with their benefits capped in London has more than doubled in the last three years.

A possible explanation for this unprecedented increase could be the influx of new households on Universal Credit since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. Furthermore, the additional £20 pound per week for those on Universal Credit could place households in a position where their…

The proportion of working-age households where none of the adults are in employment (“workless households”) was consistently low at 8% between 2016 and 2020, having almost halved since 2004 when 15% of households contained nobody in employment. However, there was a slight increase to 9% in 2022 likely as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. This means that in 2022, at least one adult does some work in 91% of working-age households in London.

In 2022 there were over 3 million households in London (50%) where all adults were in work. Another 2.5 million households in London (41%) contained some working adults and some who were not in work.

This indicator shows that household work status is closely related to household net incomes. Overall, households with lower net incomes are more likely to include inactive, retired or unemployed adults.

For example, just 8.7% of those in the bottom 20% of the net income distribution live in households where all adults work full time, while 61.5% of those in the top 20% of the net income distribution live in households where all adults work full time. On the contrary, nearly one in five of those in the bottom net income quintile live in economically inactive households, compared to just 1.6% of those in the top net income quintile.

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This indicator shows overall life expectancy at birth as well as healthy life expectancy. The latter indicates the number of years a person can expect to live in good health rather than with a disability or in poor health.

Overall life expectancy is consistently higher for women than for men in 2018 to 2020. This is true across all London boroughs. However, this is less clear for healthy life expectancy, with some boroughs having a longer healthy life expectancy for men than women. For example, healthy life expectancy for men in Tower Hamlets is 65.3 years whereas for women it is only 57.8 years.

The highest life expectancy for both women is in Kensington and Chelsea, with 87.9 and for men is …

This page looks at jobs held by London residents that are paid below the London Living Wage broken down by:

• employment type (full-time and part-time)
• sex
• sex and employment type
• ethnicity
• disability
• qualification level
• employment status (permanent and non-permanent)

These jobs may be located within London or outside the capital. For a similar analysis focused on jobs located in London only, please see 'Low-paid jobs in London'.

The London Living Wage was introduced in 2005. It is a voluntary wage rate based on the amount of money that people need to live. The rate in London in April 2022 when the earnings survey we use for this analysis was conducted was £11.05. Low-paid jobs held by Londoners rose over the decade to 2015, when almost 1 in 4 jobs (23.4%) held by Londoners were low-paid.

Although the number of jobs held by London residents in low-p…

This page looks at jobs paid below London Living Wage across London boroughs. Here we use data restricted to jobs held by people who live in London (residence-based), and their job may be based outside of London. For jobs located in boroughs, please see 'Low-paid jobs in London', chart four.

Most boroughs follow the same trend for London as a whole, with significant increases in low-paid jobs held by residents in most London boroughs between 2012 and 2020, and reductions in 2021 and 2022 (partly reflecting the distorting effects of the pandemic and furlough in London labour markets).

Brent was the borough in 2022 that saw the highest proportion of residents’ jobs being paid less than the London Living Wage with 23.6% followed by Newham at 21.2%. By contrast, Wandsworth and Hammersmith and Fulham were the only boroughs with less t…

Both Inner and Outer London have a lower old-age dependency ratio than the rest of England. In Inner London in 2020, there were 13.6 people over the age of 65 for every 100 working-age adults. This compares to 21.6 in Outer London and 32.1 in the rest of England. 

The dependency ratio reflects the degree to which the working-age population and national and local government might need to support those who are retired. As the population ages, the dependency ratio is projected to increase quite rapidly.

12.9% of working-age Londoners are out-of-work and on benefits - a slight increase since last year (12.2%).

The number of out-of-work benefit claimants aged 16-64 jumped in 2020 in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, peaking at 14.7% in 2021.

The types of benefits claimed by those out of work has also changed in recent years, as Universal Credit has rolled out across the capital. For example, 0.7% of working-age Londoners were out of work and claiming Universal Credit in 2016. By 2023, this proportion had risen to 9.7% of the working-age population. 

Compared to the rest of England

London has a slightly smaller proportion of its working-age population on out-of-work benefits than the rest of England - 12.9% compared to 13.1%. This was also the trend pre-pandemic - from 2013-2018, the proportion of the working-age population on out-of-work ben…

In both London and the rest of England, growth in hourly earnings between 2014 and 2022 was fastest for the bottom 10% of jobs. Compared to 2008 (real terms) level of hourly earnings, Londoners in the 10th job pay percentile have seen an increase of 10%. The rise was likely driven by the increase in the minimum and living wages. The National Living Wage increased from £7.50 an hour (paid to workers over 25) in 2017/18 to £9.50 an hour (paid to workers over 23) in 2022.

Between 2021 and 2022 there was a decline in hourly gross pay across all pay percentiles (in 2022 real terms). However, the decline in hourly gross pay is greater for higher paid jobs (above the median) where the COVID-19 pandemic seems to have had a greater economic impact as they aren’t protected by the increase in minimum and living wages as the bottom jobs at the bottom…

Annual earnings dropped tremendously since 2008 (in real terms) where in 2014 the bottom 10th percentile saw the largest decrease of 20.6%.

Up to 2020, there has been an increase in annual pay, in particular for the top 90th percentile as gross annual pay also includes bonuses. In 2020, the 90th percentile was close to their 2008 level annual earnings, shy only of 1.9%.

The figures for 2022 show continued significant reductions post-COVID, as pay has taken a downward turn for the bottom 10th percentile, the 50th percentile (the median), and the 90th percentile. The 90th percentile has been hit hardest with the top earners at their lowest level of real terms gross annual pay since 2002; the result of a 13% decline since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020.

Comparing annual earnings between different time periods gives a clearer pictur…

People sleeping rough by London boroughs

Poverty rates are highest among families made up of single adults with children. In both London and the rest of England 45% of these family types are counted as being in poverty. Other single person household types follow next, with couple households showing lower poverty rates. Couples without children are the least likely to be in poverty - 14% of this family type were in poverty in London for 2021/22.

If we look at the proportion of all families in poverty in London, those with children make up more than half (55%) with single persons without children making up nearly a third (32%).

Children, working age adults and pensioners all have higher rates of poverty in London than in the rest of England. Of the three age groups, children have the highest poverty rates, with 33% of children in London in poverty in 2021/22, compared to 22% of working-age adults and 23% of pensioners. 

In London, poverty rates for children and working-age adults fell between 2011/12 and 2021/22. In the rest of England, poverty rates for children went up in the same time period, and for working-age adults stayed the same.

In both London and the rest of England, the proportion of pensioners in poverty went up in this time period.

Poverty rates after housing costs were highest among children and young people in 2021/22, in both London and the rest of England.

In London:

• 160,000 children aged four and under live in households in poverty
• Almost a third (34%) of children aged 5-9 are in households in poverty
• Over a third of 10-19 year olds live in households that are in poverty (38% of those aged 10-14 and 34% of those aged 15-19).

In contrast, 17% of Londoners aged 30-34 live in households that are in poverty - the lowest rate for any age group.

Poverty rates in London are higher than those in the rest of England for people of most age groups, except for children aged 0-4 and adults aged 30-39 and 60-64.

The impacts of housing costs on poverty in the capital can again be seen by comparing these findings to those from measures of poverty before housing costs (BHC). Poverty …

Households are considered to be below the UK poverty line if their income is below 60% of the median household income after housing costs for that year.

In London people counted as being in poverty most frequently live in working households. This has been consistently the case for the last decade. In 2021/22 we find some 910,000 people in poverty are living in working households whereas just 370,000 in poverty are living in working-age workless households.

A similar pattern is true if we look at children in poverty. 510,000 children in poverty live in households where someone is in work, whereas 160,000 live in workless households.

230,000 pensioners in London are in poverty

Poverty rates vary significantly across different demographic groups in London. The highest poverty rates are experienced by workless families (52%) and households comprised of single people with children (47%). Black and minority ethnic groups are far more likely to be in poverty (33%) than white people (18%), and single pensioners also see a higher than average poverty rate at 30%.

Generally speaking all the groups included here have seen declining poverty rates since 2018/19 (the peak of the overall time series) apart from single pensioners, couples without children and workless families.

Household work status is closely related to the likelihood of the household being in poverty. This indicator focuses on poverty rates for families in London where at least one adult works. It shows that, on average, the fewer adults who are in work, the more likely the household is to be in poverty:

• Those where no adult works full-time but at least one works part-time have the highest poverty rate, with nearly half of people (44%) living in such households being in poverty.
• In contrast, only 8% of people who live in households where all of the adults work full-time are in poverty. 
• In households with two adults where only one works full time, the poverty rate is higher for those where the other adult does not work (28%) than those where the other adult works part-time (12%).

The rate of premature deaths in London is very similar to England overall. There are 17 London boroughs with rates of premature deaths that are higher than that of London and England overall.

The average number of deaths per 100,000 under-75 year olds in England is 363, whereas in London it is 359.

The boroughs that have higher rates of premature deaths are generally in the east of the city - such as Barking and Dagenham (512 per 100,000 under-75 year olds), Newham (496) and Hackney (464). The borough with the lowest premature death rate is Richmond (206 per 100,000).

Premature deaths are calculated for 2021 and look at the mortality rate for all deaths under the age of 75. They are presented as a rate per 100,000 people aged under 75 in each area.

City of London’s figures have been suppressed since their data sample is too small.

This indicator shows the reasons for not working for men and women, as well as the number of working-age people who are not working in London.

The number of men who are not working increased from 2020 Q1 to 2022 Q2 from 610k to 654k, while the number of women fell from 908k to 879k.

The largest difference between men and women is the proportion of those who do not work because they are looking after their family or home. While only 4.8% of non-working men fall in this category, 30.9% of women do.

The proportion of women who cite looking after family or home as their reason for not working fell in 2022 Q2 compared to 2020 Q1 from 36.2% to 30.9%, and so did the absolute number (329k to 272k). On the contrary, the proportion of women who were unemployed increased from 10.7% to 12.4%, with the absolute number rising from 98k to 109k. This chang…

More than one in 5 people living in Inner London (23.1%) are aged between 25 and 34. This compares to just 12.7% of those in the rest of England. More broadly, in Inner London, almost half the population is made up out of those who are in their early twenties to early forties (47.2%), compared to the rest of England where three in 10 (31.1%) are in this age group, and Inner London is home to a higher proportion of young people than Outer London.

This is caused by people moving to Inner London for work early in their careers and then leaving as they start families. The largest five-year age band is 25 to 29 year olds in Inner London, 35 to 39 year olds in Outer London and 50 to 54 year olds in the rest of England. A relatively small proportion of London’s population is over 65; 9.4% in Inner London and 13.6% in Outer London compared to 19.…

Based on average travel times by public transport, Londoners have much better access to jobs and services than people in the rest of England. For example, the average journey time by public transport to the nearest large employment centre from the 10% most deprived areas is 21 minutes in London compared to 25 minutes in the rest of England. 

For the same measure, people living in the most income-deprived areas of London have slightly better access than those in less income-deprived areas. The average journey time to public services (such as schools, GPs and hospitals) is more than 25% longer for the least deprived areas in London than the most deprived areas. 

Journey times are only part of how well Londoners can access jobs and services. Price is also an important factor with people on low incomes unable to make the most of the opportunit…

The proportion of people in London wanting to work more than they currently do fell steadily from 17.8% of the working-age population in 2011/12 to 10.8% in 2019/20. During the COVID-19 pandemic, it increased to 12.6% in 2020/21, before coming down to 10% in 2021/22, which is the lowest for the time period covered by this indicator.

Since a peak in 2011/12, the proportion of people who are unemployed fell from 7.2% to 3.7% in 2019/20, before an uptick in 2020/21 to 5.2%. The proportion who are part- time but want full time work fell from 3.7% to 2.4% in the same period, before slightly increasing to 2.6% in 2020/21: and the proportion who are economically inactive but wanting work dropped from it’s peak of 6.9% in 2011/12 before increasing from 4.5% in 2018/19 to 4.8% in 2020/21.

Moving forward to 2021/22, the overall decrease in underutil…

The unemployment rate in London more than halved since its post-financial crisis peak in 2011 (10.3%) to 4.5% in 2019. 2020 saw it increase substantially to 6.5%, reaching levels not seen since 2015. This increase is likely the result of the slowdown of the economy caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. Other factors, such as those put on furlough and the change in inactivity within the labour market, should also be considered. Unemployment rates sharply decreased again in 2022 a year when pandemic restrictions were lifted, reaching their lowest level since 1992 (4.5% in August to October 2022).

Over the past three decades, the gender split of unemployment has become more even overall. In 1993 the unemployment rate was more than 40% higher amongst men compared to women, but by the early 2010s the numbers were broadly similar for both genders. S…

The picture now

Outer London’s unemployment rate is 5%, slightly above the rate in Inner London (4%). Both Inner and Outer London have higher unemployment rates than the rest of England (4.7%).

How this has changed over time

From 2012 until 2020, unemployment followed a steady decline after peaking in the aftermath of the financial Crisis. In Inner London, the unemployment rate more than halved from 2011 to 2020 - from 10.5% to 4.5%. It recovered to pre-financial crisis levels in 2014. In Outer London, it declined from 9.3% in 2012 to 4.6% in 2019, and did not recover its pre-crisis levels until 2017. 

Unemployment surged in 2021, likely as a result of the economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. This appears to have been sharper in London. From 2020 to 2021 the unemployment rate in Inner London rose by 38% (1.7 percentage points) and in Ou…

The unemployment rates for the majority of London boroughs have seen large decreases year on year to Q1 2023 with only 3 boroughs seeing increases over the period.

Brent was the borough with the highest average unemployment rate in the year to 2023 Q1 (6.8%), having increased by 0.7ppts since Q1 2022. Kingston-upon-Thames is the borough with the lowest unemployment rate (2.3%).

There has been a decline in the unemployment rate in most boroughs, except Brent (+0.7ppts), Hackney (+0.9ppts), and Lewisham (+0.2ppts). The largest falls took place in Redbridge (-2.6ppts), Hillingdon (-2.4ppts) and Greenwich (-2.2ppts)

The figures presented here for the London boroughs are modelled estimates of unemployment for the 12 months to December of each year. The figure for the London average is based on responses to the Annual Population Survey.

The unemployment rate in London for those aged 16–24 increased by 2.9 percentage points in the year to June 2023 and now stands at 16.4%. Excluding the COVID-19 pandemic affecting 2021, this is the highest rate since 2016. 

By contrast unemployment for those aged 25–64 is significantly lower and saw a reduction in the unemployment rate from 3.8% in 2022 to 3.4% in 2023. 

Unemployment for people aged 65 and over was comparable to people aged 25–64 for the most recently available data (low survey response numbers mean we can’t report for 2022 or 2023; however, relatively few in this group are either in work or seeking work, as the majority are retired.

Unemployment rates among the working age population (16-64) are higher in London than in the rest of England, which has been true for the whole time period covered by this indicator. 

Compared t…

Just over 5% of people in work in London are on temporary contracts. Temporary contracts are more prevalent amongst women in work than men: 30% more women than men were on a temporary contract in 2022 (Q2).

The proportion of workers on temporary contracts has remained relatively consistent over the past decade, fluctuating between just over 4.5% and just under 6% of all workers. In 2022 (Q2), 0.84% of women in work and 0.66% of men in work were on a temporary contract and reported that it was because they could not find a permanent job

The picture today

People of Pakistani/Bangladeshi background have the highest rates of not being in paid work, with 38.9% of the working-age population not working, followed by people of Black ethnic background (36.1%). 

White people have the lowest rate of being out of work (19.3%) followed by people of Indian background at 24%. 

How this has changed over time

Every major ethnic group in London has seen a fall in the proportion of people who are not in paid work in the decade up to June 2023. In 2013, almost half of Londoners of Pakistani/Bangladeshi background were not in paid work (48.9%), down to 38.9% today. 

People of Black ethnic background have had the smallest fall in the proportion of people not in work in the last decade (4 percent points). 

People of Black and Mixed background are also the only groups to have seen an increase in th…

Just under two-thirds (63%) of working-age women in London who were born in Bangladesh did not work in the year to March 2021/22, the highest rate of any nationality. Pakistani women are not far behind with 61% not working. Of men in London who were born overseas, those from China have the highest rate of worklessness (28%).

Women originally from Portugal had the lowest rates of worklessness (2%), while those from Sri Lanka had the lowest rate for men (9%). For most countries, the worklessness rate is higher for women than men, although this trend does not hold true for countries such as Lithuania, Portugal, France, Romania, Poland and Italy.