A recent survey conducted by Populus shows there is a clear generational divide over the issue of whether to increase taxation to help fund the public sector, with under-45s being much less supportive than those aged over 45.<\/p>\n
The results indicated that older people would favour raising taxes to fund public services, while younger adults would prefer volunteers to help ease the growing crisis in social care.<\/p>\n
Overall, 41 per cent of the public believes taxes should increase to fund public services such as the NHS, while just 33 per cent of 18 to 24-year-olds and even fewer (only 30 per cent) of those aged between 25 and 44 agree.<\/p>\n
In contrast, the strongest backing came among those aged over 65 (54 per cent), 55-64 (46 per cent) and 45-54 (42 per cent).<\/p>\n
Results revealed that only eight per cent of over-65s agreed that \u201cwe should cut taxes and reduce spending on public services\u201d compared to 21 per cent of 25 to 34-year-olds who think that this should happen.<\/p>\n
Ed Cox, the RSA\u2019s Director of Public Services and Communities, said: \u201cThe NHS can\u2019t afford to keep mitigating our failure to invest in what leads to good health: a welfare system that promotes economic security; investment in early years, education and skills; and better quality jobs for all.\u201d<\/p>\n
It was clear from the poll that younger adults have very different priorities than people in older age groups. Mr Cox stressed: \u201cAside from a shared commitment to tackling inequality, there is neither a clear consensus on tax increases nor agreement on how any extra money is spent.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe younger generations who\u2019ll pay for increased spending see climate change and technological adaptation as greater challenges than the ageing society,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n
Less than a quarter of those aged 18-44 think that increasing taxation is the best solution, compared to over half (54 per cent) aged 65 and over; thus highlighting the chasm of opinion between age groups.<\/p>\n
When asked which policy areas the Government should focus on, those aged 45 and over identified inequality, the ageing society and social isolation and mental health.<\/p>\n
In comparison, those aged 45 and under had a different set of priorities; even though isolation was emphasised in their top three, the biggest area of interest was climate change (48 per cent), as well as, international relations and Brexit.<\/p>\n
Mr Cox added that the findings showed that \u201ctraditional left-right politics is being flipped on its head, as under-45s back lower taxes and a smaller state, despite overwhelmingly voting Labour in the last election, while Conservative-leaning voters over-65 back higher taxes and spending.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A recent survey conducted by Populus shows there is a clear generational divide over the issue of whether to increase taxation to help fund the public sector, with under-45s being much less supportive than those aged over 45.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":2786,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[24,7,27,32],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bainesjewitt.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2784"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bainesjewitt.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bainesjewitt.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bainesjewitt.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bainesjewitt.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2784"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.bainesjewitt.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2784\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2785,"href":"https:\/\/www.bainesjewitt.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2784\/revisions\/2785"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bainesjewitt.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2786"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.bainesjewitt.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2784"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bainesjewitt.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2784"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.bainesjewitt.co.uk\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2784"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}