There is a widening gap in life expectancy and health between people who are affluent and those who are poorer. The poorer you are the more risks you face at each stage of life. The poorest people in society suffer more risks throughout life including; increased risk of miscarriages and stillbirths, higher risk of babies born underweight, higher risk of infant mortality, higher risk of long term illness including mental illness, higher risk of disability and shorter life span. The Mental Health charity MIND carried out a survey in 1998 on the main causes of stress and anxiety. Surprisingly the number one cause in their "top ten" was money worries. Poor health can lead to having a lower wage job and therefore leading to poverty.
There has been a significant growth of the amount of people employed in the UK over the past few years but many of the new jobs have been part time and under paid. In 1996, 260,000 people entered employment of which 63% were part time. Chancellor Gordon Brown, recently claimed that there were 1,000,000 unemployed and 1,000,000 vacancies and insisted that if only the unemployed took up the opportunities created there would be no unemployment. These unemployment statistics show poverty will continue to reoccur and that unemployment is a major cause of poverty. In 1996 it was estimated that almost a quarter of employees in Great Britain earned less than £4 per hour and in 2001 2,000,000 adults over the age of 22 were paid under £4.30 per hour. People who are low paid can also be vulnerable to unemployment, and are often lower paid if and/or when returning to work. These people often get into 'low pay, no pay' cycle. An employee re-entering work after losing their job will earn on average 9% less than in their last job (child poverty action group, 'Poverty: the Facts - 4th Edition', 2001).
Education plays an important role in the cause of poverty as a poor education can often lead to unemployment or a low paid job, this can result in poverty as insufficient funds will not support the family.
b. Poverty can very easily lead to poor health conditions of both a mental and physical kind, in extreme cases poverty can determine the risk of mortality on an individual. Mental health issues can be cased as a sense of self-morality can be lost and depression can set in quickly. A sense of worthlessness, shame, feelings of failure and humiliation can be felt when an individual puts their family in the risk or poverty. The result of poverty can often lead to drug abusers, alcohol addicts, violence in domestic and other situations.
Children in poverty driven families can be bullied at school for being different and more diverse, they may appear different as they cannot keep up with the ‘trends’ and new fashions like the other children. Poverty can also increase risk of anti-social behaviour in teens across the UK. Children may not have the same obligation to want to learn and classroom behaviour could affect their growth as a person as well as the other children’s around them.
As well as affecting the family in a superficial way, poverty can increase chances of divorce within a family leaving a single parent. “Single mothers, black children, and those living below 150% of the poverty index were much more likely to be in poor or fair health than children in two-parent families, white children or those in more affluent families.” (Am J Public Health. 1996 Oct;86(10):1401-5)
