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Government investment in working-class areas
Former Member
Posts: 1,876,323 The Mix Honorary Guru
Ok, I'm hoping someone who is a bit more policy savvy than me will be able to help me. One of my arguments in my PhD thesis is that more money is spent and more investment is made in middle-class areas than in working-class area. This differential social capital provision is one of the reasons why working-class areas have such high rates of crime etc (I'm simplifying it for the sake of brevity, I know it's more complicated than that). The problem, however, is that I can't find any literature to back this up. I basically want to find an article that says 'more money is spent in middle-class areas than in working-class areas'.
Or maybe I'm totally wrong and it's the other way round?
In any event, can anyone help?
Or maybe I'm totally wrong and it's the other way round?
In any event, can anyone help?
0
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Of course finding an article that has already done this is a lot easier but i've no idea where to find one.
It's also more complex in that investment often crosses boundaries. eg if an RDA puts money into a shopping centre in middle class area A, it will often attract workers from working class area B - so they benefit. In fact it will have put it in A, because working class area C also can travel to work as well.
That's why out of the 3 towns I cover, the poorest has more police, better access to medical care, more choice of infant schools, far more youth provision e.t.c.
The rich town I work in has activities for the youngsters once a week. The poor town has stuff going on every night.
The people who pay the most in council/income tax, get pretty much the bare minimum in return. The people paying the lowest get the most. Where's the fairness in that?
Bringing this more up to date - take a look at this bullshit to come out of the Tory Party today. According to the Quiet Man, good behaviour on council estates should be rewarded by letting people buy a part of what usually looks like a council-built lego set at a knock down price. Bollocks to that. Increasing the flow of money to poor areas is not the answer. Cutting off the bottomless pit of money is what is needed. If people know they cannot depend on the state to assist them forever, that would change things.
We have social services departments that have budgets of £100million a year, (yes, I'm talking about you, Haringey) yet they can't seem to stop babies being beaten to a pulp on their watch. And why is that? Because we have a system which supported the sort of disgusting squalor that the sub-human filth who killed Baby P lived in. There was rat shit all over the floor, and the house apparently had dead animals in it. And somehow, I doubt they were paying their own way, were they? Cut the supply of money off.
I only wish more were spent on middle-class areas!
However I (and many others) would be asking the same question if every effort within reason was not being made to help those who need it the most, and who could not pay for any of it otherwise.
I should imagine residents in Chelsea have rather less need for activities for youngsters, or certainly rather less need for government assistance to organise them, than residents of a sink estate where every kid is at considerable risk of becoming an offender or become a drug user.
Giving bigger tax credits and benefits to those earning 15,000 p.a. than to those earning 50,000 could be described as 'unfair' too. But I hope we all recognise the reasons behind this 'discrimination' and fully support them. There is no difference between that principle and that of providing more support for deprived areas.
Obviously, there are going to be regional variations - Slough, Stoke and Glasgow all have working and middle class areas; the variation in spending in those areas probably won't be the same for all three.
A good starting point might be the regional development agencies who are responsible for a lot of regeneration work (both physical and economic) in England. The equivalent in Scotland would be Scottish Enterprise. London has the LDA.
All of these have a lot of publications but are obviously not the only organisations who spend money at a local level. Local Authority spending would also be worth investigating though I am unsure about how localised the data will be (the LGA is probably the best place to start). Remember that 'poor' regions/localities sometimes contain pockets of wealth. The London borough of Tower Hamlets contains Canary Wharf for instance (though maybe they won't have money for much longer...).
Good luck with the research. Let us know if you find any good resources. I'm sure everyone will be happy to debate them here!