Scottish cities

Child Poverty in Scottish Cities
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Over 34% of children in Glasgow were living in poverty in 2017. This is the highest among Scotland’s major cities; for example, twice the rate in Aberdeen and over one and a half times that of Edinburgh.

Note

The data for this graph come from End Child Poverty’s Child Poverty map of the UK.

Other measures of child poverty

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Poverty statistics often only include households with incomes below a poverty threshold (usually 60% of middle incomes). Recently the Scottish Government has published figures that consider other resources as well as income.

These measures are based on experimental statistics. Unlike  the previous graph, which is based on data from HMRC which looks at children on out of work benefits and children in families on tax credits whose reported family incomes are below 60 per cent of the median, these new experimental measures take into account resources as well as income. The measures report on children in families that cannot afford basic necessities (they live in material deprivation) as well as having a low income (70% of middle incomes).

This produces a slightly different picture of child poverty across the Scottish cities, though figures are still highest in Glasgow, at 43%. There may be some degree of measurement uncertainty, more information on this can be found on page 7 of the Scottish Government report.