Title
Contents
Acknowledgements 8
The Authors 9
Glossary 10
A guide to methods used in the charts and tables 12
Summary 14
1. Introduction 18
1.1 Poverty among families with children 18
1.2 Aims of the report 19
1.3 The Families and Children Study 20
2. The incidence of persistent poverty among families with children 24
2.1 Using low income as an indicator of poverty 24
2.2 Measuring total family income in FACS 26
2.3 Measuring income poverty in FACS 28
2.4 Measuring persistent poverty in FACS 29
2.5 Summary 31
3. The financial circumstances of persistently poor families with children 32
3.1 Income levels and sources of income 32
3.2 Current and savings accounts 34
3.3 Borrowing and debt 36
3.4 Managing family money 39
3.5 Financial worries now and in the future 41
3.6 Summary 43
4. The outcomes for children living in persistently poor families 45
4.1 Be healthy 47
4.2 Stay safe 49
4.3 Enjoy and achieve 51
4.4 Making a positive contribution 53
4.5 Achieve economic well-being 55
4.6 Multiple negative outcomes 58
4.7 Summary 60
5. The factors associated with persistent poverty among families with children 62
5.1 Work status and attitudes to work 62
5.2 The risk of persistent poverty 69
5.3 Modelling the key risk factors of poverty persistence 71
5.4 Summary 78
6. Summary and discussion of main findings 80
Appendix: Logistic regression statistics 83
References 91
Table 2.1 Longitudinal poverty status of families with children, 2001/04 31
Table 4.1 Longitudinal poverty status of children, 2001/04 46
Table 5.1 Characteristics of families with children that are statistically significantly associated with the odds of persistent, rather than temporary, poverty 74
Table A.1 The association of socio-demographic and economic characteristics of lone mothers to persistent poverty: Variables that are significant in the logistic regression model (MODEL: persistently poor compared to temporarily poor, work status from ... 83
Table A.2 The association of socio-demographic and economic characteristics of couple families to persistent poverty: Variables that are significant in the logistic regression model (MODEL: persistently poor compared to temporarily poor, work status from ... 84
Table A.3 The association of socio-demographic and economic characteristics of lone mothers to persistent poverty: Variables that are significant in the logistic regression model (MODEL: persistently poor compared to ... 85
Table A.4 The association of socio-demographic and economic characteristics of couple families to persistent poverty: Variables that are significant in the logistic regression model (MODEL: persistently poor compared to ... 86
Table A.5 The association of socio-demographic and economic characteristics of lone mothers to persistent poverty: Variables that are significant in the logistic regression model (MODEL: persistently poor compared to temporarily poor, work status in 2004 ... 87
Table A.6 The association of socio-demographic and economic characteristics of couple families to persistent poverty: Variables that are significant in the logistic regression model (MODEL: persistently poor compared to temporarily poor, work status in 2004 ... 88
Table A.7 The association of socio-demographic and economic characteristics of lone mothers to persistent poverty: Variables that are significant in the logistic regression model (MODEL: persistently poor compared to non-persistently poor, work status from ... 89
Table A.8 The association of socio-demographic and economic characteristics of couple families to persistent poverty: Variables that are significant in the logistic regression model (MODEL: persistently poor compared to non-persistently poor, work status from ... 90
Figure 2.1 Percentage of families with children living in income poverty 2001/04, according to the Households Below Average Income series (DWP, 2007a) 28
Figure 2.2 Number of times families with children were living in poverty, 2001/04 30
Figure 3.1 Median total weekly amount of equivalised income, 2001/04 33
Figure 3.2 Access to a current or savings account, by poverty status, 2001/04 35
Figure 3.3 Saving behaviour, by poverty status, 2001/04 36
Figure 3.4 Behind with household bills, by poverty status, 2001/04 37
Figure 3.5 Debt by poverty status, 2001/04 39
Figure 3.6 Falling behind with loan repayments, by poverty status, 2001/04 40
Figure 3.7 Running out of money by the end of the week, by poverty status, 2001/04 41
Figure 3.8 Money worries, by poverty status, 2001/04 42
Figure 3.9 Number of years in which families said they thought their financial situation would improve in the future, by poverty status, 2001/04 43
Figure 4.1 Children with a long-standing illness or disability (in 2004) by poverty status (2001/04) 48
Figure 4.2 Children who spent less than an hour on physical activity in the last week (in 2004) by poverty status (2001/04) 49
Figure 4.3 Children who have been bullied in a frightening or upsetting way at least three times in the past year (in 2004) by poverty status (2001/04) 50
Figure 4.4 Children who have been offered illegal drugs in the past year (in 2004) by poverty status (2001/04) 51
Figure 4.5 Children who were below average in English and maths (in 2004) by poverty status (2001/04) 52
Figure 4.6 Children who were expelled or suspended from secondary school (in 2004), by poverty status (2001/04) 53
Figure 4.7 Children who have been in trouble with the police in the last year (in 2004), by poverty status (2001/04) 54
Figure 4.8 Children who had not seen friends in last week and did not go to organised activities (in 2004) by poverty status (2001/04) 55
Figure 4.9 Children living in bad housing (in 2004), by poverty status (2001/04) 56
Figure 4.10 Mean number of items children in families did not have (in 2004), by poverty status (2001/04) 58
Figure 4.11 Number of negative outcomes secondary school children face (in 2004) by poverty status (2001/04) 60
Figure 5.1 Family work status, 2004 63
Figure 5.2 Risk of being persistently poor, by family work status (2004) 64
Figure 5.3 Risk of being persistently poor, by longitudinal family work status 66
Figure 5.4 Persistently poor mothers' job readiness, by work status of mother (and partner in couple families) 67
Figure 5.5 Risk of being persistently poor, by family work status in 2 004 combined with job readiness 68
Figure 5.6 Risk of being persistently poor, by socio-demographic characteristics of family 69
Figure 5.7 Risk of being persistently poor, by socio-economic characteristics of family 70
Figure 5.8 Factors that increase the likelihood of persistent, rather than temporary, poverty among families with children, odds ratios, model with a point-in time work status measure 75
Figure 5.9 The impact of longitudinal work status on factors that increase the likelihood of persistent, rather than temporary, poverty among families with children, odds ratios 77
Boxes
Box 1.1 Main themes covered in FACS 2004 22
Box 2.1 The modified OECD equivalence scale 27
Box 5.1 Characteristics included in the logistic regression analysis 72
Box 5.2 Understanding an odds ratio 73