UK's 'Nine of Ten Poorest Regions' Drops to Two With a Different Income Measure
By GDP per head, the UK does occupy nine of Northern Europe's ten poorest regions; switch to household disposable income—a better proxy for living standards—and that figure drops to two.
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The argument · tap a timestamp to hear it
The shocking number is just old data from a decade ago
Labour MP Steve Reid cited a claim that nine of Northern Europe's ten poorest regions are in the UK, but it traced back to a 2014 analysis by Inequality Briefing using Eurostat data from 2011—over a decade old, yet repeatedly cited as current evidence. The definition of "Northern Europe" in that analysis was also problematic: it included Germany and France while excluding the Baltic states.
Switch the income metric, nine seats become two
Oxford Economics' Liam Sides reran the analysis with 2024 data using the same GDP-per-head methodology, finding UK still occupies nine of the ten poorest regions—so the problem isn't outdated data. But GDP per head measures regional output, not what residents actually take home. Switch to household disposable income (after-tax earnings), which better reflects living standards, and UK's position drops from nine regions to two: Northumberland, Durham, Tyne and Wear, and Tees Valley.
— Liam SidesTwo methodological flaws compound to paint a grimmer picture
The analysis uses a single national purchasing power parity figure rather than region-specific adjustments. Since London's prices are far higher than elsewhere, using the national average understates the living costs in wealthy London and overstates them in struggling regions. Additionally, UK statistical regions (700,000 to 2 million people) are much smaller than their French and German equivalents—Paris's statistical region, for instance, has 12 million people. Larger regions average out local poverty across more prosperous areas; finer-grained UK divisions expose deprivation more acutely.
— Liam SidesChange the method, the real UK problem persists
Setting aside this contentious analysis, if you measure GDP, wages, or income by the regional divisions familiar to British readers—Southeast, Southwest, Midlands, and so on—London's gap from the rest is actually wider than the capital-to-provinces gap in other developed nations. This conclusion holds across multiple studies and multiple metrics. In other words, the original analysis was flawed, but the underlying reality it tried to point to—that UK regional development is severely uneven—is genuine.
— Liam SidesDonkeys really do get more donations than political parties
The Economist's claim holds true on one measure: by donations alone, Donkey Sanctuary received £52 million while seven major UK political parties combined took £47 million. But when you include all revenue sources—party membership fees and other sources—the parties' combined take was £128 million versus Donkey Sanctuary's £59 million. No single political party outearns the donkey charity, but collectively they do.
That £350k migrant cost is actually from the Netherlands
Some commentators multiplied £350,000—cited as the lifetime net fiscal cost per migrant—by 781 small-boat arrivals daily to produce a £273.4 million annual bill. But Migration Observatory researcher Madeleine Sumption noted that the £350,000 figure comes from Dutch research on Dutch refugees, not UK data. Britain does have a proper domestic estimate: family-reunion immigrants cost an average of £109,000 over a lifetime—well below the Dutch figure that had been misapplied.
— Madeleine SumptionThe productivity gap's root is declining survey quality
The UK's apparent post-2008 productivity slowdown compared to other nations vanished when the Office for National Statistics revised its methodology. As Financial Times economist Chris Giles explained, that gap emerged precisely when labour force survey response rates began collapsing—from robust pre-crisis levels down to under 20% at their nadir. Deteriorating survey quality compounds small measurement errors into seemingly persistent trends over years.
— Chris GilesDo beekeepers really live longer? The evidence is thirty people
The claim that beekeepers are the longest-lived profession rests on a single 2015 Malaysian study: 30 beekeepers versus 30 controls, with the beekeepers showing longer telomeres. But the control group consumed no bee products whatsoever—the real association is with honey consumption, not beekeeping itself. Experts also point out the study shows no age-related telomere shortening at all, a basic fact of human biology that should appear in any population. With a thirty-person sample, the observed difference is far more likely random noise than real effect.
In their own words · checked verbatim
Nine of the 10 poorest regions in the whole of Northern Europe are here in the UK, which is the second richest country in Europe.
Steve Reid1:01
This is a number that's been doing the rounds for about a decade or so now. The claim originally came from a company called Inequality Briefing, and this was released in 2014 using data from Eurostat that was dated to 2011.
Liam Sides1:01
what you can see is that two of the 10 poorest regions are actually in the UK, rather than nine of the 10 poorest regions being in the UK.
Liam Sides3:11
And the reason that's a big issue is that larger regions with more people get that deprivation that exists averaged out over a larger land zone, a larger population mass.
Liam Sides5:14
So I think where this number might be from is a Dutch study that looked at the fiscal impact of refugees in the Netherlands. It's a perfectly good study. It's not an estimate for the UK.
Madeleine Sumption13:37
What's really gone on here is because it happened at a time when the Labour Force survey's quality was going down and down and down the pan, basically. It went from a very high response rate before the financial crisis to about under 20% at its worst point.
Chris Giles20:45
But I think that the biggest criticism of this is that you don't see a correlation in this paper between telomere length and age. And that is something that we would certainly expect.
Ramsey Bowden25:59
My suspicion is more that this is due to chance differences in many of the other factors that are known to influence telomere length in a population of only 30 individuals has resulted in them having two populations with significantly different telomere length.
Ramsey Bowden27:01
Figures
| UK regions among Northern Europe's ten poorest by GDP per head | 9 out of 10 | 1:01 |
| UK regions among the ten poorest by household disposable income | 2 out of 10 | 3:11 |
| Population of Paris's statistical region | 12 million | 6:21 |
| Donkey Sanctuary donations received | £52 million | 9:29 |
| Seven major UK political parties combined donations | £47 million | 10:30 |
| Donkey Sanctuary total revenue including all sources | £59 million | 10:30 |
| Seven major UK political parties combined total revenue | £128 million | 10:30 |
| Calculated annual fiscal cost of small boat arrivals at 781 daily | £273.4 million | 11:35 |
| Beekeeping and longevity study sample size | 30 beekeepers vs. 30 controls | 24:55 |
Glossary
- Purchasing Power Parity (PPP)
- Adjusting economic comparisons to account for regional cost-of-living differences.
- GDP per head
- Regional economic output divided by population; measures regional production, not resident income.
- household disposable income
- After-tax income available to households; a better proxy for actual living standards than output metrics.
- telomere
- Protective cap at the end of a chromosome that naturally shortens with cell division and aging.
How to listen
Anyone concerned with UK regional inequality, immigration policy costs, or how exaggerated figures in the news are fabricated.
The asides about donkeys and political parties can be skipped without losing the data conclusions.