[00:01.07]Not everybody has benefited though
[00:03.46]and there are much greater inequalities
[00:05.59]than twenty years ago.
[00:06.87]The top 20% are much richer-
[00:09.59]they now have 46% for the nation's wealth
[00:12.08]compared with around 35% in 1981.
[00:15.70]The bottom 20% of society society are now
[00:18.28]relatively much poorer and their share of the
[00:20.74]nation's wealth has declined from 10% to 6%.
[00:25.24]Problems like begging and homelessness
[00:27.57]are on the increase.
[00:29.69]Life expectancy has gone up steadily.
[00:31.85]In 1981, British men could expect to live
[00:34.54]around 70 years and British women
[00:36.58]on average 75 years.
[00:38.68]Now men live 74 years and women 79.
[00:43.28]Over the last twenty years,
[00:45.02]unemployment has fluctuated
[00:46.60]but has gone down recently.
[00:49.19]It went up form around 1.7 million in 1981
[00:52.54]to 2.1 million in 1989 only to fall beneath
[00:57.23]a million in the spring of 2001.
[01:00.08]However, we work much longer hours than before,
[01:03.01]in fact the longest in Europe.
[01:06.37]There are many more women working than before-
[01:08.48]nearly 72% compared with 57% in 1981,
[01:12.60]the highest figure in Europe.
[01:14.43]However, on average women still only earn
[01:17.63]80% of that earned by men.
[01:19.58] |