Kevin Ralston, York St John University, 2017
The idea that there are multiple generations of the same family who have never had a job has popular, political and international resonance. In politics, UK Minister, Chris Grayling, is on record as stating there are ‘four generations of families where no-one has ever had a job’.
This belief in ‘generations of worklessness’ is often accompanied by the idea that there is an associated culture of worklessness. For example, Esther McVey, when she was Minister of State for Employment, made reference to the widespread notion that there is a ‘something for nothing culture’ among some of those claiming benefits.
Politicians of the red variety have also expressed similar sentiments. In a speech, where he discussed levels of worklessness in the UK, former Labour Prime Minister, Tony Blair, claimed that, behind the statistics, there were some households which have three generations who have never worked.
Ideas associated with generations of worklessness also regularly appear in the traditional UK print media. In 2013 the Daily Mail[1] reported a story about an individual who was convicted of burning down his house, which resulted in deaths. They used his status as a benefits claimant in order to characterise living on welfare benefits as a ‘lifestyle choice’ for some. This point is irrelevant to the human tragedy described but it is useful in spreading the notion of a benefits culture.
These recent examples have been foreshadowed by long running historical and academic debate. A report for the Department of Work and Pensions suggested versions of ideas like generations or cultures of worklessness have been around for 120 years. Michael B. Katz argues that themes of these types have characterised U.S. welfare for 200 years.
In US politics the idea of the ‘welfare queen’ has been used to justify policy in a similar manner to the UK’s ‘benefits cheats’ stereotype and the general notion, that there is a section of undeserving poor who should receive punishment or correction, is a key aspect of neo-liberal politics.
Underclass theory provides a theoretical expression of the type of thinking present in the generations theses. Central to underclass theory is the idea that generations have been socialised into worklessness. More widely the theory puts forward that problems of illegitimacy and crime negatively define sections of society (the underclass).
We have undertaken newly published research which has searched for three generations of worklessness. This applied data collected over time, to assess whether there is any truth in the sorts of claims made by people like Chris Grayling. This research was the first to use representative data (British Household Panel Survey) to directly test whether three generations of worklessness could be identified in the UK. We found no evidence to support the belief that there are large numbers of families who have several generations that have never worked.
Although ideas around generations of worklessnes are widely expressed and have a long running history, the evidence does not support the theory. Lindsey Macmillan, an economist from University College London, estimated the numbers of families, from within the same household, in which there are two generations who have never worked. This was found to be a fraction of a percent. Other research has found similar results. A small scale study, which also looked for three generations of worklessness within deprived areas, could not find any such families.
The idea that there are generations of workless, who live in a culture of worklessness, creates a picture that there are large numbers of people trained to expect ‘something for nothing’. Arguments made in support of this type of thinking tend to be self-serving and used to push an agenda ignoring the structural problems that lead to people being unemployed.
The available evidence is against the existence of generations of worklessness. There is an ethical imperative on those involved in journalism, or formulating policy, to, at least, have an awareness of this evidence. Those, in these fields, who maintain these ideas are, at best, ignoring available evidence and at worst, wilfully misrepresenting reality.
In the absence of supporting evidence it is time to end over a century of debate. We need to do away with the pathological idea that there are large numbers of people in receipt of welfare benefits because they come from families that are too lazy to work.
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