Given the last two decades' changes in the income distribution, is society as a whole now better off or worse off? This is an important question, but it is not immediately obvious that there is a straightforward and clear-cut answer to it. If inequality has increased (the Kinnock view), and yet...

This paper analyses low income dynamics in Britain using the first four waves of the British Household Panel Survey. There is much low income turnover: although there is a small group of people who are persistently poor, more striking is the relatively large number of low income escapers and...