Tory Distortion : Wages and Welfare

Nearing closer to 2015,  a flailing coalition and Nigel Farage clinging to your like an annoying child at the supermarket has undoubtedly spooked the Tories as of late. It seems that the compassionate, supposedly non-ideological coalition of 2010 has faded, and the games of dirty politics have truly been inaugurated in 2013.

It seems that the geniuses at Conservative HQ have decided to resurrect one of their most disgusting campaign slogans yet- crudely labelled 'strivers versus shirkers', although 'scroungers' or even 'vermin' might suffice as an alternative phrase for the latter.  In effect, this incredibly vitriolic (and ironically, rather Victorian) image is an attempt to win the hard-line right wing that have defected to UKIP (estimated to be around 18% + of the Tories) and to try for the highly unlikely, second attempt to secure a majority in 2015.  And while most people take the necessities of dirty politics with a pinch of salt, the Tories have indeed, slipped to a new low. Through a perverted manipulation of statistics, an attempt to marginalise and vilify those on welfare is being implemented in a way the editors of the Daily Mail could only dream of.



The Claim

Ian Duncan Smith (IDS) has claimed that welfare benefits have risen disproportionately higher than private sector wages over the past ten years. This, he says, is unfair to the 'strivers' who work while welfare claimants presumably sleep, watch TV and eat cereal in their underwear. IDS hopes that welfare reform- which in this case involves curtailing some benefits, while capping others at a 1% increase p.a (below inflation), will force claimants to, as one remembers just a few years ago, 'get on their bike'.

Realities
I thought that I would try out some statistical fact checking in order to see how legitimate these claims were.

This graph from NOMIS shows an average increase in wages between 2002-2012 to have increased by just under 30% (29.87). Note that there are some methodological discrepancies which I havent accounted for, mainly due to time.

Comparing this with welfare is difficult, as there are multiple measurements in which this can be conducted. Ed Balls, Labour Shdow -Chancellor, compared the statement to JSA figures. This Fact Checker correctly notes the increase in JSA allowance for those over 25 without dependents to have increased by around 31%,  far from the stark contrast one would expect from IDS' statement.  So while IDS might be right in theory, the margin between welfare and pay rises is far too narrow to justify a significant attack within the strivers vs scroungers paradigm.

So then we come onto this wonderful gem, that IDS stated to the Daily Mail (you really couldn't make this up) that : 

average benefits rose by 20% over the last five years but the average weekly wage for private sector workers rose by less than 12% (link here). 

The chart documenting changes in weekly earnings here show that between 2002-2007, average weekly earnings across the labour force rose by around 16%, while 2007-12 saw a much lesser increase, at around 10%. At the same time, a key benefit we are looking at, the JSA, increases from £59.15 in 2007 to £71.00 in 2012, which does collate to an estimated 20% increase.

Yet, this point alone is disingenuous. Unless IDS has been living under a rock for the past 5 years, which unfortunately doesn't seem to have been the case, he would have noted that this fairly significant financial crisis kind of happened between 2007-2009/10 which had a fairly significant effect on wages. Thus, prior to the recession, wages were roughly on par with the increase in JSA benefit, while the downturn saw a shift in the balance, whereby wages were considerably less. Take this into account, and the whole 'strivers vs scroungers' doesn't really seem as clear as IDS would have you believe.