If you want to receive regular updates from us, please complete this form to join our mailing list.
It’s been a big month here at the Commission! On 12th September, our State of the Nation 2023 – People and Places report was laid in Parliament, and our new Data Explorer tool was launched alongside it. This year’s report gives an in-depth regional breakdown of social mobility prospects for the first time, and we hope you’ll be able to join us next week for our online event discussing our key findings and plans for the coming year.
At the end of August we also launched our brand new website! All the content currently available on socialmobilityworks.org will be found on the ‘For employers’ section of our new site before the end of the year. And don’t worry if you have existing bookmarks – these will all be redirected.
Thanks for reading,
The SMC Employers Team
Upcoming events:
2023 State of the Nation report: People and Places
Thursday 28th September 2023, 2-3pm
Join us at this online event where our Interim Chair, Alun Francis OBE, will be discussing our 2023 State of the Nation report: People and Places, charting the evolving social mobility landscape across the United Kingdom.
This event will give you an opportunity to find out more about:
- How our State of the Nation report extends and builds on the work we started in 2022 and contains important new elements – looking at full mobility outcomes, intermediate (early-life) outcomes, and drivers, with breakdowns by geography and personal characteristics.
- Our new Data Explorer Tool – this new Tool will allow information on income, occupation and education to be broken down by regions, ethnicity, gender and disability.
Find out more and register for 2023 State of the Nation report: People and Places
Employers’ Masterclass: Data – Addressing the challenges and understanding the opportunities
Thursday 26th October 2023, 2-3pm
Alongside other diversity data, do you collect the socio-economic background of your employees? If the answer is no, not yet, or ‘we’re trying to’ – then this masterclass is for you.
We’ll be joined by Hollie Crompton, Social Mobility Lead at PwC, who will discuss their journey in collecting and improving socio-economic data.
After attending this event, you will have a better understanding of
- What you should be asking, and how you should be asking for this information
- How to create a communications plan that helps to increase response rates
- Challenges you might encounter along the way
- What this data can tell you about your organisation
Find out more and register now for our Employers’ Masterclass on Data.
Hear more from the SMC:
2023 State of the Nation report: People and Places
Our State of the Nation 2023 – People and Places report was laid in Parliament on Tuesday 12th September!
The report gives an in-depth regional breakdown of social mobility prospects for the first time. Our analysis shows that social mobility outcomes do not only depend on who your parents are and your education but also where you grew up, with upward occupational mobility from working class to professional highest for people who grew up in Outer London or Surrey and Sussex.
However, it’s much more nuanced than the traditional North/South divide as, once we control for socio-economic background, young people also have a higher chance of unemployment, economic inactivity and lower working-class employment in London.
Find out more and read the whole State of the Nation 2023 – People and Places report now
Data Explorer tool
Alongside our State of the Nation 2023 – People and Places report, Tuesday also saw the launch of our innovative new Data Explorer tool.
At the press of a button you can explore social mobility outcomes broken down by region and characteristics to understand differences across men and women, ethnic groups, and disability.
Looking at outcomes in terms of people and places gives us much greater insight into where social mobility is and isn’t working, and for whom.
Try our Data Explorer tool out for yourself now!
In case you missed it:
- At the end of August, we launched our brand new website which will eventually house all of the SMC’s research, publications and advocacy projects. We’re really excited to have this new space to better showcase the wide variety of work that we do, and to help us reach even more people over the next year!
- A recent report from Onward found that the least socially-mobile areas of the UK are missing out when it comes to council funding. They describe a ‘social mobility penalty’, where, after taking deprivation into account, an area in the top decile for social mobility receives 50% more in grants than an area in the bottom decile.
- The Social Market Foundation recently published ‘Social mobility and its critics’, an essay which considers the difference between equality of outcome and equality of opportunity. It suggests that, rather than focusing on whether the most disadvantaged can access a small number of universities or elite professions, it is better to think in terms of providing equality of opportunity. This would ensure every individual has a better chance to realise their full potential, whatever it may be and whether or not it moves them up the social hierarchy.
- Last month, The National Centre for Social Research (NatCen) published its fourth annual Society Watch report. The aim of the Society Watch series is to provide a snapshot of what life is like for people in Britain today, focused around a particularly timely societal issue. This year’s report ‘The Price We Pay’ focuses on the social impact of the cost of living crisis.
- Over the last year, the SMC has been working to deliver various actions from the government’s Inclusive Britain policy paper. One of these is to recommend a new benchmark that looks at the extent to which universities are supporting social mobility. Find out more about our plans for this new access benchmark here.