MIS to be rebased for all household types in 2024

The Joseph Rowntree Foundation (JRF) has said that in 2024 all household types in its Minimum Income Standard (MIS) will be rebased, starting from scratch with groups of members of the public¹. The announcement was made in its report A Minimum Income Standard for the United Kingdom in 2023, published on 8 September 2023¹.

MIS has set out what households need to spend to reach an acceptable standard of living since 2008, based on detailed deliberations by groups of members of the public¹. In 2023 the budgets were updated based predominantly on price changes as captured through the Consumer Prices Index, with private rent data and recalculated domestic fuel costs used instead of CPI for those categories¹.

The 2023 report found that a single person needs to earn £29,500 a year to reach a minimum acceptable standard of living, and a couple with two children need to earn £50,000 between them¹. It said the increase in what is needed to reach MIS over the past year was driven by the rapidly rising cost of many goods and services, with increases in the cost of domestic fuel and food having a notable impact¹.

The report also set out how far different household types fall short of MIS, including cost-of-living support payments¹:

On uprating, the report said April 2023 saw an inflation-based increase in benefits of 10.1%, following a year in which safety-net benefits saw their greatest fall in value since annual uprating began in 1972¹. It said the National Living Wage rose 9.7% in April 2023, from £9.50 to £10.42, an increase above CPI inflation of 8.7% in April 2023 but one that did not make up the gap resulting from a well below inflation increase in 2022, and did not cover the increase in the cost of a minimum budget over the past year¹. The more comprehensive financial support provided to households during 2022-23 ended, replaced by a cost-of-living payment totalling £900 in 2023-24 for low-income households in receipt of means-tested benefits, with additional support for pensioner households and households in receipt of disability benefits¹.

Why it matters for households

MIS is a benchmark for what the public considers a minimum acceptable standard of living, and the 2024 rebasing means the contents of that benchmark will be rebuilt rather than uprated for price changes alone¹. The 2023 figures show the gap between MIS and the incomes of households on out-of-work benefits and on the National Living Wage, including after cost-of-living support payments¹. The report said that even with those payments, a couple with two children on out-of-work benefits have half of what they need, and that single working-age adults without children receiving the support have 30% of what they need on out-of-work benefits, rising to 73% of MIS in full-time work on the NLW¹. The £900 cost-of-living payment for 2023-24 applies to low-income households in receipt of means-tested benefits, with separate support for pensioner households and households in receipt of disability benefits¹. The report also said that without the cost-of-living support payments, the figures for a couple with two children fall from 50% to 48% where neither is working, from 77% to 74% where one works full time, from 88% to 86% where one works full time and one part time, and from 95% to 92% where both work full time¹.

What happens next

The rebasing of all household types is stated for 2024, with groups of members of the public starting from scratch to produce detailed descriptions of the goods and services the public agree are needed to live with dignity in the UK today¹. No further dates for the rebased budgets have been reported¹. The report also points to a Minimum Income Calculator for working out whether earnings are enough for an acceptable standard of living¹. The regulation and policy hub covers how such benchmarks feed into public debate.