The UK has higher levels of “intergenerational fairness” than all but three European countries, according to a new report on welfare across the EU by the International Logevity Centre UK.
Covering a number of welfare areas alongside intergenerational fairness, the research ranked 24 European countries according to the welfare gap between retirees, the working population and young people.
The UK came in fourth position, behind the Netherlands, Austria and Germany.
Hungary, Greece and Italy were the least fair, followed by Norway and Sweden.
However, the report did not rank actual levels of welfare, but merely the discrepancy between generations, meaning they could be equally well-off or equally badly-off.
The report’s author Dr Cesira Urzì Brancati said: “The UK appears to score fairly high on intergenerational fairness; however, when we focus on the individual variables, we find some notable exceptions.
“For instance, the difference in poverty rates of the 65 plus and the working age population are higher than average, while the difference in poverty rates of the young and the working age population is slightly lower.”
Alongside intergenerational fairness, the report measured poverty and social exclusion, health of the population, access to education and quality housing.
The UK’s overall position was eleventh. Three of the top five countries - Switzerland (first) and Iceland (third) and Norway (fourth) - were non-EU members.
The other two were Sweden (first) and Finland (fifth).
Turkey, also a non-EU member, came bottom, followed by Hungary, Poland, Portugal and Poland.
The UK scored particularly poorly on housing quality, despite the state spending almost twice as much as any other country on housing, as a percentage of GDP.
Dr Brancati said: “As the UK’s population is ageing rapidly, future governments need a coherent strategy to deliver a welfare state which guarantees the best possible provision for the largest number of people across the UK.
“This strategy cannot be based on what is politically expedient; instead, future governments must base these judgements on evidence,” she argued, adding the UK government should look at approaches to social security, health, housing and education across Europe to identify successful strategies.
james.fernyhough@ft.com
