Around 24 million people in Great Britain were reducing energy use in their home between March and June 2022, and around 16 million cut back on food and essentials.

Around 9 in 10 (89%) adults in Great Britain continue to report that their cost of living has increased, equal to around 46 million people. This is an increase from around 6 in 10 (62%, 32 million adults) when we first started asking this question in November 2021.

The most common reasons reported by these adults for their increased cost of living were:

• an increase in the price of their food shop (94%)
• an increase in gas or electricity bills (82%)
• an increase in the price of fuel (77%)

This is according to the latest data from the Opinions and Lifestyle Survey, collected between 20 and 31 July 2022.

We have used a larger pool of data to examine the different actions being taken by those experiencing an increase in their cost of living in more detail during the period 30 March to 19 June 2022.

For those who had seen their cost of living go up, the most common lifestyle changes they had made as a result were:

• spending less on non-essentials (57%, around 26 million people)
• using less gas and electricity in their home (51%, around 24 million people)
• cutting back on non-essential journeys in their vehicle (42%, around 19 million people)

More than a third of those whose cost of living had gone up cut back spending on food and essentials (35%, around 16 million people). Almost a quarter (23%, around 11 million people) used savings to cover costs, and 13% (around 6 million people) said they were using more credit than usual.

Nearly 6 in 10 people who have seen their cost of living rise cut spending on non-essentials

Actions taken by people who reported their cost of living had increased over the past month, Great Britain, 30 March to 19 June 2022

Notes

1. Question: “Which of the following are you doing because your cost of living has increased?”.
2. Respondents could select more than one option.
3. Approximate numbers of adults are calculated by applying the percentage for each category indicated to the weighted number of people in Great Britain represented by those answering this question on the Opinions and Lifestyle Survey.

Download the data for actions taken by people whose cost of living increased (XLSX, 19KB)

How common these actions were differed by a range of characteristics, including age, disability status, personal income, or how deprived an area a person lived in was.

The dataset provided with this article contains estimates of all breakdowns considered. We have published similar estimates for the period November 2021 to March 2022, when a smaller proportion of people reported experiencing increased costs of living.

Around 4 in 10 disabled people experiencing rising cost of living cut back on food and essentials

Disabled people were more likely than non-disabled people to have reduced their spending on food and essentials because of their increased costs of living (42%, compared with 31%).

Economic factors, such as personal income and the level of deprivation of the area they live in (based on the Index of Multiple Deprivation), also appeared to affect a person’s likelihood of having reduced spending on food and essentials.

Among those who had seen cost of living increases, those living in the most deprived fifth of areas in England were more likely to have cut back on food and essentials (42%) than average (35%). Meanwhile, those in the least deprived fifth of areas were less likely (27%).

Those in the most deprived areas were more likely to have reduced spending on food and essentials

Percentage of people who have cut back on food and essentials because their cost of living has increased over the past month, by deprivation quintile, England, 30 March to 19 June 2022

Notes

1. An area’s deprivation quintile is based on the Index of Multiple Deprivation (IMD), data for which were only available for England.
2. Question: “Which of the following are you doing because your cost of living has increased?”.
3. Respondents could select more than one option.
4. Estimates displayed are rounded to the nearest whole number.

Download the data for people who cut back on food and essentials (XLSX, 19KB)

Similar differences were seen by personal income. Among those who had seen their costs rise, those taking home over £40,000 per year were less likely to have cut back on essentials. However, more than a quarter of adults with an income of £40,000 to £50,000 per year were still doing so (27%), as were more than a fifth of those with an income of £50,000 or more (22%).

Meanwhile, around 4 in 10 (39%) of those with an income between £10,000 and £15,000, £15,000 and £20,000, or £20,000 to £30,000 per year were cutting back on food and essentials.

People living in rented housing whose cost of living had gone up were more likely to have reduced their spending on food and essentials (46%) than those who own their homes outright (27%) or are paying off a mortgage (33%). Those in shared ownership schemes (where they pay a mortgage on part of the home and rent on the other) also appeared more likely to be cutting back on essentials, at 42%.

This may be because those in rented housing were more likely to be seeing costs increase in other areas. While renters were no more likely than mortgage payers to report an increase in their cost of living, they were twice as likely as those paying a mortgage to report their housing costs as a reason for this (33% of renters compared with 16% of mortgage payers). The difference in the responses of renters and mortgagors here likely reflects some mortgagors being on fixed rate mortgages, whereas renters may be more exposed to increases in rent.

People aged between 55 and 74 years appeared more likely to reduce their gas and electric use

In a period where people may have been affected by the recent increase to the energy price cap from 1 April 2022, using less gas and electricity in their home was the second most common action people across Great Britain were taking if experiencing the rising cost of living. It is also important to note that responses were collected over spring and summer when people were less likely to be heating their homes because of warmer weather.

People aged between 55 and 74 years were more likely to be cutting their energy use than those in the majority of other age groups. Around 6 in 10 of those aged 55 to 64 years (58%) and 65 to 74 years (59%) reported doing so.

Those aged 16 to 24 years were less likely to report reducing their energy use at home. This is possibly because some people in this population are not yet bill payers.

People aged between 55 and 74 years appeared most likely to be reducing energy use in their home

Percentage of people who have cut back on fuel such as gas and electricity in their home because their cost of living has increased over the past month, by age band, Great Britain, 30 March to 19 June 2022

Notes

1. Question: “Which of the following are you doing because your cost of living has increased?”.
2. Respondents could select more than one option.
3. Estimates displayed are rounded to the nearest whole number.

Download the data for people who cut down on energy use in their home by age (XLSX, 19KB)

Disabled people were also more likely to be reducing their gas and electric use, with 55% of disabled people who were experiencing an increase in their cost of living reporting this change, compared with 50% of non-disabled people. These are likely connected, as older people are more likely to identify as disabled than younger people.

People in London appeared less likely than those in other regions to be cutting their energy use with 41% of Londoners reporting this change, compared with 51% in Great Britain overall.

It is likely that many of the differences explored here are linked: for example, the age profile of London is younger than the rest of Great Britain, with the average age of Londoners almost five years below the UK average in 2020.

Londoners appeared less likely than residents of the rest of Great Britain to have cut energy use in their homes

Percentage of people who have cut back on fuel such as gas and electricity in their home because their cost of living has increased over the past month, by region, Great Britain, 30 March to 19 June 2022

Notes

1. Question: “Which of the following are you doing because your cost of living has increased?”.
2. Respondents could select more than one option.
3. Estimates displayed are rounded to the nearest whole number.

Download the data for people who have cut back on fuel by region (XLSX,19KB)

Cutting electricity and gas use was more common than average among those who were earning between £10,000 and £15,000 per year (56%), and less common among those earning more than £50,000 per year (44%).

Those on the highest incomes were least likely to have reduced personal travel

When asked what was contributing to their increased cost of living between March and June 2022, almost 8 in 10 (79%) people cited the rising price of fuel. Overall, of people whose cost of living had gone up, 42% said they were reducing the number of non-essential journeys they made in their vehicle.

The percentage of people who cut back on non-essential journeys in their vehicle reduced as income increased, although the difference was only statistically significant between those with an income of £50,000 per year or more and those with an income of less than £40,000 per year. Less than a third (31%) of people with an income of £50,000 or more had reduced non-essential journeys, 11 percentage points less than among all people who had seen cost of living increases. Those on the lowest incomes were generally less likely to take journeys using personal vehicles prior to the recent rises in the cost of living, according to data from the Department for Transport.

People living in rented housing were less likely to report this change than average, at 35%. People in shared ownership schemes were more likely to have done so, although sample sizes for this population are smaller than for others. This may be related to an individual’s likelihood of having a vehicle at all. According to the 2011 census, 87% of households that owned their home (whether outright or with a mortgage) had 1 or more cars or vans in their household, compared with 60% of households in rented homes, and 44% of households in social housing.

Just one-fifth of Londoners had reduced journeys in their vehicle (22%). This is perhaps because using a private vehicle is less common there, while those in the East Midlands were more likely than average to have done so, at 48%.

Disabled people were more likely to have reduced the amount of non-essential journeys they took than non-disabled people (46% compared with 40%). This is despite disabled people tending to report making fewer non-essential trips in general prior to recent rises in the cost of living.

Those living in the most deprived areas more likely to be using credit

Just over 1 in 10 (13%) people in England reported using credit (such as credit cards, loans or bank overdrafts) more than usual because of the rising cost of living. However, this rose to almost one-fifth (18%) among those living in the most deprived areas and fell to 8% among those living in the least deprived areas.

Residents of the most deprived areas of England were more likely to be using more credit because of increases in their cost of living

Percentage of people who have used more credit than usual because their cost of living has increased over the past month, by deprivation quintile, England, 30 March to 19 June 2022

Notes

1. An areas deprivation quintile is based on the Index of Multiple Deprivation (IMD), data for which were only available for England.
2. Question: “Which of the following are you doing because your cost of living has increased?”.
3. Respondents could select more than one option.
4. Estimates displayed are rounded to the nearest whole number.

Download the data for people who have used more credit than usual by deprivation quintile (XLSX, 19KB)

Using more credit appeared to be less common among those with an income of less than £10,000 (10%) or earning more than £50,000 (10%) than on average (13%). This may reflect differences in access to credit or in the need to use it.

Further detail on actions taken because of rising living costs, as well as other issues related to increases in the cost of living such as people’s ability to pay bills, are available in the associated dataset.

We will be publishing further analysis of how the cost of living crisis is affecting individuals in the coming months, including how parents are being affected (in August 2022) and detailed analysis of the sub-groups of the population struggling with paying bills (in autumn 2022).