Britons have been told to brace for a decade of pain with household income plummeting to the worst levels on record, the Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) has warned.
Slamming John Healey’s first Budget as “unhelpful fiddling”, the economic think tank cautioned his unveiled measures do not go far enough to take Britain off a grim fiscal path.
In the aftermath of the announcement on Wednesday, the IFS said the average British family’s disposable income would increase by an average of just two per cent over the course of the 2020s – the worst level of recorded growth in more than seven decades.
The bleak forecast would mean the country would fail to see growth surpass that of the 1950s – a decade where Britain was still living under brutal post-war rationing measures.
IFS director Helen Miller said: “This decade looks set to be the worst decade for growth in household incomes on record.
“No amount of temporary cost of living packages will fix that. We need a stronger economy.”
Ahead of his speech, Mr Healey insisted his budget would deliver “breathing space” for households and businesses across the country.
Speaking yesterday, the Chancellor said his announcement of £100 off energy bills for about 20 million households in England was an “important payment”.
He added: “Now, you can’t remove all the rises, you can’t remove all the pressures that people are facing.
“But my aim is to say, look where we can, we’ll act, we’ll give people a bit of breathing space and [we’re] doing that with this household energy payment.”
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