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Article: Poor show: poverty. (in the UK)
- Article from:
- The Economist (US)
- Article date:
- July 10, 1993
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1993 Economist Newspaper Ltd. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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CUT taxes on the rich. Curb state benefits for the poor. The rich will produce more. The poor will price themselves into jobs. Result: less poverty. So ran the trickle-down approach to poverty embraced by the Tories from 1979 on. Hence ministerial embarrassment when, on June 30th, their own social-security department published figures which suggested that the theory is not working.
The survey ("Households Below Average Income 1979 to 1990-91") showed a dramatic fall in the share of total incomes going to the worst-off 10% of households: from 4.0% to 2.1%. At the other end of the spectrum, the number of households on more than Pounds600 a week (at 1993 prices) rose ...