CASE Social Exclusion Seminar: Abigail McKnight

This is a HYBRID event, with an option to join the seminar in-person at the LSE, or virtually. The speaker will present in-person.

Means-tested benefits play an essential role in protecting working age non-working households from destitution and topping up the incomes of households with low earnings. While for many this support may only be required for short periods of time, for others longer-term support may be necessary.

The introduction of Universal Credit in 2013 which gradually replaced six legacy means-tested benefits to become the main benefit for working age people has provided a sharper focus on means-tested support. Universal Credit blurs the boundary between out-of-work support and in-work support with over one-third of Universal Credit claimants in work. However, little is currently known about long-term benefit receipt, limiting the development of an effective strategy to help claimants break free of benefit conditionality and achieve financial independence. This research, commissioned by the Social Mobility Commission, is designed to address key knowledge gaps. It analyses 15 years of longitudinal survey data from Understanding Society spanning 2009/10 to 2023/24. It provides new estimates of prevalence and trends in long-term receipt, and identifies the core demographic and socio-economic factors that define long-term recipients. Estimates on the dynamics of long-term receipt provide new evidence on benefit persistence and the socio-demographic characteristics of individuals most likely to enter or exit long-term receipt.

This research was joint with Margaret Kayitale, CASE Occasional Research Assistant.

Abigail McKnight is an Associate Director of the Centre for Analysis of Social Exclusion (CASE) at the LSE. Abigail’s research interests include poverty, social mobility, multidimensional inequality, employment policy and social security. She recently led the official review of the UK material deprivation measures and published a report quantifying multiple insecurities in the UK.