a post by Duncan Exley for the Transforming Society blog
The UK, in the post-war decades, saw a remarkable degree of upward social mobility, with large numbers of people getting higher-status jobs than their parents had at the same age. The decline of social mobility since then has prompted some to say that it has ‘ground to a halt’, which isn’t at all true: there is still substantial social mobility, it’s just that most of it is downward.
The average family in Middle Britain is now more likely to slide down (in occupational terms) than they are to ‘go up in the world’. There is a similar picture in homeownership: In just 10 years (2006/07 to 2016/17) the proportion of 35- to 44-year-olds in England who were owner occupiers dropped from under three-quarters to just over half. We are now nearing the tipping point at which having your own home in your late thirties and early forties is the exception rather than the rule for families in the middle of the income spectrum.
The End of Aspiration? Social Mobility and our Children’s Fading Prospects, published today [15 May 2019], asks why this is happening, and why — despite demonstrable public disquiet about receding opportunities – mainstream politicians’ attempts to harness the anger and aspiration have not succeeded in winning public buy-in.
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