Compared to what?

We are very much in favour of Thomas Sowell’s interesting question - “Compared to what?”

More than one in four children with care worker parents are growing up in poverty, according to a report by Trades Union Congress, with the union warning of “rampant” hardship in households with key workers.

The TUC said that 220,000 children – 28.4% – with at least one social care worker as a parent were in poverty, and said the number was on course to rise to nearly 300,000 by the end of this parliament unless action was taken to improve pay and conditions in the sector.

This is, of course, relative poverty. Living in a household with less than 60% of median household income, adjusted for household size. Given that neither the TUC nor Landman Economics have deigned to actually publish their study we can’t tell whether this is before or after housing costs.

So, to ask Sowell’s question, compared to what?

Child poverty continues to rise. The latest data tells us that almost one in three children in the UK are living in poverty (31%). Nearly half of children in lone parent families live in poverty, compared with one in four of those in couple families.

Oh. So poverty rates among care workers are lower than they are in the general population. Or, care worker incomes are higher than they are in the general population - the same statement.

So, that’s something that seems to be solved then, isn’t it?