Pensioner income
Published
1. Main facts and figures
- in the 3 years to March 2024, pensioner families received an average of £689 a week in total income before deductions (‘gross income’)
- White pensioner families had the highest gross income (£697 a week) out of all ethnic groups
- Black pensioner families had the lowest gross income (£489 a week)
- in the 16 years to March 2024, gross weekly income went up for White (from £659 to £697) and Asian (from £550 to £583) pensioner families
- gross weekly income went down for pensioner families in the Black (from £517 to £489), Mixed (from £576 to £499), and Other (from £630 to £500) ethnic groups
- in the 3 years to March 2024, of all ethnic groups for whom data was available, White pensioner families were the most likely to receive income from occupational pensions (64%), investments (60%), and personal pensions (17%)
- Black pensioner families were most likely to receive income from income-related benefits (39%) – White pensioner families were least likely (20%)
- in the 16 years to March 2024, the biggest increase in State Pension income was for White pensioner families (from £210 to £247)
2. Things you need to know
What the data measures
The data shows how much income pensioner families in the UK receive every week from all sources before taxes and other deductions, by ethnicity.
A ‘pensioner family’ is either a single pensioner or a couple (married or living together) that includes at least one pensioner.
The data does not include income from other people in the household (such as adult children), except for the benefit income of dependent children.
The data only covers private households.
Percentages are given to the nearest whole number. Income is rounded to the nearest pound. Population sizes are rounded to the nearest 100,000. This means some figures may not add up to the totals shown.
Not included in the data
The data does not include people living in communal accommodation (such as care homes) or with no fixed address.
Average income is not shown for ethnic groups where fewer than 50 households were surveyed. Percentages are not shown where fewer than 100 households were surveyed.
This is because the numbers involved are too small to make reliable generalisations.
The ethnic groups used in the data
The data uses the ethnic group categories from the 2011 Census.
Data is aggregated for the following ethnic groups:
- Asian
- Black
- Mixed
- White
- Other
This means estimates are shown for these groups as a whole.
Download the data to see data for the following ethnic groups:
- White British
- Any other White (all other White groups combined)
Some households contain people from different ethnic backgrounds. The ethnicity assigned to the household is that of the head of the household, usually the person with the highest income. The data does not account for people of different ethnic backgrounds who live in the same household.
Ethnicity was known for over 99.9% of pensioner households in the survey. Those with unknown ethnicity are excluded from this data due to small sample sizes.
Methodology
Read the detailed methodology document for the data on this page.
The data is a series of 3-year averages. The latest is from April 2021 to March 2024. This is to make sure there are enough pensioner families to be able to make reliable generalisations. You can read more about combining multiple years of data and some of the issues involved.
Data for groups with sample sizes of less than 100 are withheld due to small sample sizes.
Confidence intervals have not been worked out, so comparisons between ethnic groups and between time periods may not be reliable.
Household income has not been adjusted (or ‘equivalised’) to take into account the number of people who live there.
All income is adjusted for inflation using variants of the Consumer Price Index. This allows us to see how income has changed over time in real terms.
The FRS has been shown to under-report the number of people receiving benefits compared with the Department for Work and Pensions’ administrative records. For this reason, the percentage of people receiving benefits shown here is likely to be slightly lower than the real percentage.
The data is based on survey data. Find out more about:
- interpreting survey data, including how reliability is affected by the number of people surveyed
- how weighting is used to make survey data more representative of the whole group being studied
In the data file
Download the data for:
- gross and net income figures for the 3-year periods between April 2008 to March 2024
- data by type of income
- data for the White British and Any other White ethnic groups
3. By ethnicity over time
| 3 year period | All | Asian | Black | Mixed | White | Other |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| £ | £ | £ | £ | £ | £ | |
| 2008/09 to 2010/11 | 655 | 550 | 517 | 576 | 659 | 630 |
| 2009/10 to 2011/12 | 662 | 571 | 518 | 664 | 666 | 637 |
| 2010/11 to 2012/13 | 656 | 575 | 484 | withheld because a small sample size makes it unreliable | 660 | 702 |
| 2011/12 to 2013/14 | 654 | 597 | 474 | withheld because a small sample size makes it unreliable | 658 | 711 |
| 2012/13 to 2014/15 | 666 | 559 | 490 | 584 | 670 | 806 |
| 2013/14 to 2015/16 | 674 | 526 | 493 | 632 | 681 | 748 |
| 2014/15 to 2016/17 | 685 | 523 | 497 | 654 | 692 | 796 |
| 2015/16 to 2017/18 | 685 | 497 | 476 | 623 | 693 | 733 |
| 2016/17 to 2018/19 | 688 | 502 | 533 | 694 | 695 | 652 |
| 2017/18 to 2019/20 | 686 | 482 | 508 | 634 | 695 | 669 |
| 2018/19 to 2020/21 | 695 | 509 | 620 | 623 | 702 | 797 |
| 2019/20 to 2021/22 | 695 | 497 | 582 | 534 | 704 | 758 |
| 2020/21 to 2022/23 | 697 | 534 | 610 | 558 | 704 | 622 |
| 2021/22 to 2023/24 | 689 | 583 | 489 | 499 | 697 | 500 |
Download table data for ‘By ethnicity over time’ (CSV) Source data for ‘By ethnicity over time’ (CSV)
4. Data sources
Source
Pensioners' Incomes: financial years ending 1995 to 2024
Type of data
Administrative and survey data
Type of statistic
National Statistics
Publisher
Department for Work and Pensions
Note on corrections or updates
The calculations on pensioners' incomes for financial year 2022 to 2023 missed a cost of living payment, impacting the data. This has been fixed in the current release, with a £1 per week increase in pensioners' gross income.
Publication frequency
Yearly
Purpose of data source
The pensioners’ incomes series is based on data from the Family Resources Survey (FRS). The main purpose of the FRS is to give the Department for Work and Pensions data to develop, monitor and evaluate social welfare policy.
The survey is also used by other government departments, including for tax and benefit policy modelling by HM Treasury and HM Revenue and Customs. The FRS is also used by academics and research institutes for social and economic research.
5. Download the data
This file contains the following: measure, ethnicity, ethnicity_type, time, time_type, geography, geography_type, measure_type, value, value_type