Consumption trends in the UK, 1975-99

Published on 1 February 2004

How and why has the way in which the average British family spends its money changed over the past 25 years? Those are the key questions examined in this report, using data from the UK FES between 1975 and 1999. It looks not only at broad changes in total spending, but also at how the division of expenditure between basics and non-basics and between durable goods, non-durable goods and services has altered over time.

Downloads

Image representing the file: r65.pdf

r65.pdf

PDF | 1.09 MB

How and why has the way in which the average British family spends its money changed over the past 25 years? Those are the key questions examined in this report, using data from the UK FES between 1975 and 1999. It looks not only at broad changes in total spending, but also at how the division of expenditure between basics and non-basics and between durable goods, non-durable goods and services has altered over time.

    Authors

    Person graphic

    Laura Blow

    Person graphic

    Andrew Leicester

    Person graphic
    Zoe Oldfield

    Head of Data Services

    Zoe is Head of Data Services. She joined the IFS in 1998 as a researcher and moved into Data Services in 2011.

    Report details

    DOI
    10.1920/re.ifs.2004.0065
    ISBN
    978-1-903274-31-6
    Publisher
    IFS

    Suggested citation

    L, Blow and A, Leicester and Z, Oldfield. (2004). Consumption trends in the UK, 1975-99. London: IFS. Available at: https://ifs.org.uk/publications/consumption-trends-uk-1975-99 (accessed: 24 April 2025).

    More from IFS

    Understand this issue

    Policy analysis

    Academic research

    Working paper cover

    Health inequality and health types

    working paper

    We use k-means clustering, a machine learning technique, and Health and Retirement Study data to identify health types during middle and old age.

    3 October 2024