Eduin Latimer
Economist at Institute for Fiscal Studies, interested in low-paying labour market and the tax and benefit system.
- Reposted by Eduin LatimerAn excellent and much-needed explainer of our complicated and controversial student loans system
- The @lowpaycommission.bsky.social annual report is out. As always contains lots of insights. This is key chart for me: 20% of jobs are now paid within £1 of the minimum wage, up from 14% in 2015. Whatever you think of the minimum wage, its increasingly important!
- You can find the report here: www.gov.uk/government/p...
- Great to make first appearance on IFS Zooms In Pod. @helenmiller.bsky.social and I were joined by the excellent @alanmanning4.bsky.social to talk about what's happened to to the UK minimum wage, and what impact its having on the UK labour market. Give it a listen.
- Reposted by Eduin LatimerHere's a starter pack of IFS economists posting on BlueSky. Make sure you're following them all for the top-quality economic analysis on labour markets, inequality, public finances, healthcare, education and more! go.bsky.app/NYPwMBat://did:plc:yf6xggzm2dq6vo6kjl6tpgui/app.bsky.graph.starterpack/3mcknwpqt2u2s
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- Great to get this new research out. We find that following cuts to non-health benefit income cause more people to claim disability benefits.
- "The big-picture lesson for policymakers is that changes to one part of the benefit system can shift pressures elsewhere, rather than remove them entirely." 📗 Read our report, funded by @jrf-uk.bsky.social and @healthfoundation.bsky.social, here: ifs.org.uk/publications...
- Our results are important for benefit design. Policy makers should account for the indirect effect of changing one bit of the benefit system on other bits of the system.
- They also provide some insight into the recent surge in disability benefit claims. Our results provide some suggestive evidence that rising cost-of-living is one factor behind the recent surge in disability benefit claims.
- Reposted by Eduin LatimerNEW: Cuts to non-health-related benefits caused increases in disability benefit claims, our new report finds. 📗 Jonathan Cribb, @heidikarj.bsky.social, @eduinlatimer.bsky.social, Sam Ray-Chaudhuri and Tom Waters examine the impact of four cuts to benefits in the 2010s [THREAD:🧵]:
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- The Government has announced that the adult minimum wage will increase by 4.1% to £12.71. This is likely to be faster than inflation and average earnings growth. The UK’s minimum wage is already one of the highest amongst developed countries and this will push it higher.
- Minimum wages for younger workers are also set to grow faster than the 21+ rate as the Government moves towards its commitment to equalise the 18-20 minimum wage rate to the 21+ minimum wage.
- While @lowpaycommission.bsky.social have closely monitored recent increases and found no clear evidence of negative employment effects, recent falls in employment in low-paid sectors such as hospitality make this is a riskier time to raise minimum wage rates than some recent years.
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- New work out on children receiving support for disabilities in school and/or benefit system. 50% of children with most severe needs aged 15 were not in work, education or training (NEET) aged 22. Improving outcomes for this group is vital if gov wants to cut NEET rate
- And this is a growing issue. The share of children getting high-level targeted support for additional needs has doubled across both the benefit and education systems.
- For lots more detail and interesting facts you can read the green budget chapter here: ifs.org.uk/publications...
- You can also watch back to our event discussing the report with valuable comments from @ruthpatrick0.bsky.social here: ifs.org.uk/events/why-d...
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- @matthewoulton.bsky.social and I have a new @theifs.bsky.social comment out looking at the case for transitional protections for existing claimants when making benefit cuts and some of the related risks. We use the government's recent benefit reforms as an example. A short thread🧵
- First, what were the transitional protections in the recent reforms? The big cut (around £2,500 a year) was for new claimants to the health element of universal credit. In contrast, the government decided to fully protect existing claimants, so they see no cut to their income in real-terms.
- These protections are a big decision. They reduce the savings from the reform in 2029/30 by around £5 billion.
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View full threadFinal note: long-lasting protections for existing claimants are not unique to this government. There are many previous reforms where governments faced similar trade-offs. We discuss them in the comment: ifs.org.uk/articles/whe...
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- Last month, a new detailed survey of mental health amongst adults in England came out. Headline result is that more 16-64-year-olds have a common mental health conditions than in any previous wave of the survey over last 30 years. A brief thread...
- The results from this new survey match the trend from four other surveys that we @theifs.bsky.social found when we looked at this earlier this year.
- Anxiety is the fastest growing mental health condition, double as many people report the symptoms of generalised anxiety disorder as did in 2007. The most common condition remains the vague “common mental health condition-not otherwise specified” category.
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View full threadApologies, 2014 figures in initial graph in the above were inaccurate. Corrected graph here, no change to key message.
- So after a lot of debate and a lot of talk about fiscal sustainability, the confirmed reforms in the government's UC/PIP bill (so excluding the Timms review) will effectively save nothing by 2029/30.
- They are still a big redistribution from new UC health claimants to current UC claimants and over the longer term will have a big impact on spending as UC health changes get rolled out. OBR estimate the new lower UC health level alone will save £8.5bn in long term
- And likely to be more changes to come! If future reforms are to be a success more work needs to be done to understand why there has been a £16bn rise in health-related benefit in last 5 years.
- The Government have announced changes to their proposed benefit reforms. By 2029/30 the original plans would have saved £5.5bn, but revised plans will only save £2.5bn so changes cost £3bn. However, since all changes only protect current claimants, long run savings from package still around £11bn.
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- There are lots of rumours about potential changes to the government's benefit reforms in response to political challenges. The table below shows the costs and impacts on claimants of various options. If the government does choose to scale back overall cut, they have decision about who to help.
- Short @theifs.bsky.social discussion of potential options to roll back planned benefit cuts available here: ifs.org.uk/articles/opt...
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- Last week the Government released more information on their planned tightening of eligibility to disability benefits, with striking figures on health conditions and age. A short thread (1/8)
- Claimants with back pain or arthritis are much more likely to lose some/all of their disability benefits (on average around £4,500 a year) than claimants whose main condition is anxiety, depression or autism. (2/8)
- Relatedly, older disability benefit claimants are also much more likely to be affected by the changes to eligibility than younger claimants. (3/8)
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View full threadSecond piece of context. The government currently rarely reassesses Personal Independence Payment claimants over state pension age. If they continue to do this, current claimants who are over state pension age will be mostly shielded from this reform. (8/8)
- Reposted by Eduin LatimerState pension age starts rising again in April 2026. Most people in their early 60s know their state pension age, but a significant minority are incorrect or unaware. This is worrying as people may base retirement and saving decisions on incorrect information. Short thread👇
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- Important chart to put the Spring Statement welfare reforms into context. Over last fifteen years we have seen a shift in working-age welfare spending towards health-related benefits. OBR projections suggest the Government's plans will slow this trend but not stop it.
