Growing up in the Unequal Kingdom

Examining what the research suggests that children think about inequality

Economic inequality is unfair on everyone, but there’s little doubt that it bears down hardest on children.

As our Wealth Gap Risk Register has documented, the absolute wealth gap in the UK grew by 54% between 2011 and 2021, and wealth plays a bigger role than ever in shaping life chances and outcomes. Many have argued that the consequences of that wealth gap has a disproportionate, and particularly harmful effect on children, particularly given the context that 1 in 3 children in the UK grow up in poverty while the amount of wealth climbs ever higher.

The evidence on what the wealth gap means for uneven opportunities between children in their development is stark. Research suggests that higher levels of parental housing wealth are associated with fewer emotional and behavioural problems in children, and healthier psychological development, even after accounting for income, socioeconomic status, and family characteristics. There is also a strong positive correlation between parental wealth and children’s educational attainment, even after controlling for parental income and education levels. It’s well documented that wealthier parents can provide more educational resources and opportunities, private tutoring, extracurricular activities, the ability to fund higher education without loans, and are more likely to afford private schooling altogether. Policies that directly cut the incomes of families with children compound this further. The two-child limit was one of the starkest examples as a policy choice that concentrated its effects on some of the most disadvantaged children in the country.

Despite this impact of inequality on children, most academic research into beliefs and perceptions about economic inequality has focused on adults. Less attention has been paid to children and young people, or to how their views change as they develop morally and socially. A short report that we are publishing today, Growing up in the Unequal Kingdom, begins to address that gap. Drawing on a rapid review of 21 peer-reviewed empirical studies, it examines what children understand about economic inequality, how they respond to it, and how those responses change with age.

The report, authored by Anita Sangha, builds on other work that examines the perceptions of young people. For example, the National Youth Strategy acknowledges the importance of economic inequalities, and the Big Ask survey by the Children’s Commissioner suggests that children want to see a fairer society. Meanwhile, a survey of 18–24-year-olds by the Sutton Trust and More in Common found that more young adults are concerned about the impact of inequality on education, work, health, and social mobility than the general adult population. A majority believed the government should do more to tackle inequalities, and that coming from a wealthy family was important for getting ahead in life.

Four findings from our rapid review of the evidence stand out:

• First, children’s understanding of inequality develops with age. Younger children tend to judge inequality as unfair mainly when it disadvantages them personally. According to Chao et al. (2025), older children, perhaps drawing on more sophisticated moral reasoning, are more likely to perceive both advantageous and disadvantageous inequalities as unfair. Meanwhile, Essler and Paulus (2021) found that older children were more likely than younger children to support “Robin Hood” strategies i.e. taking from the rich to give to the poor. Notably, Rizzo et al. (2020) found that older children asked to evaluate a resource allocation strategy that perpetuated inequalities as more unfair than younger children, even when it benefitted them personally

• Second, children’s own experiences of inequality shape their reasoning. Young people from poorer backgrounds are more critical of the rich (Mistry and Yassine, 2022), while adolescents from lower socioeconomic backgrounds are more likely than their peers to view social exclusion of the poor as unfair (Gonul et al., 2024). Conversely, children from wealthier backgrounds are more likely to frame cross-class friendships in terms of violations of social hierarchy (according to Grutter et al. 2021), reflecting how lived experience can colour moral judgement from an early age.

• Third, several studies have found that when people are placed in situations where resources are distributed unequally, they tend to behave in a less generous way, for example, donating less to children in need (Kirkland et al., 2020, 2021). This is consistent with findings from adult research: a meta-analysis of 100 studies by Yang and Konrath (2023) found a significant, if small, negative effect of inequality on prosocial behaviour. Older children were less likely than younger children to act selfishly when inequality benefitted them, perhaps suggesting that moral development can partially offset this effect, but the underlying dynamic is a concern (McGuire et al. 2019, Chao et al. 2025).

• Finally, social exclusion based on economic status provokes negative emotions in children. Older children report more negative emotions than younger children when witnessing a poor child being excluded (Dys et al., 2019). Children also expect those who are excluded to feel sadness and loneliness (Acar and Sivis, 2023). These findings suggest that children are not passive observers of inequality, they respond emotionally to it, and those responses intensify as they grow older.

Taken together, these findings suggest that the views of children on inequality should be considered more fully in the development of policies to tackle inequality. Several mechanisms exist to do this by considering the role of future generations and young people and overcome the chronic short-termism that remains endemic in our politics. For example, Wales’ Future Generations Act requires leaders across policy domains to consider the interests of future generations. Commitments to lower the voting age to 16 would give young people a more direct stake in democratic decisions. Proposals for a Parliamentary Committee on the Future, focused on long-term and intergenerational policy, would provide a formal space in which the perspectives of children and young people could inform legislative debate.

As wealth inequality looks set to deepen, the research reviewed in our new report is a reminder that children are moral agents who perceive unfairness, feel its emotional weight, and, as they grow older, increasingly believe something should be done about it. The question is whether the adults making policy are listening.