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Debt and Wealth Inequality

Why do financial inequalities prove so hard to shift? Laurie Taylor looks at Ryan Davey's study on a southern English housing estate and Sarah Kerr's work on wealth.

What does an 18-month study of residents on a housing estate in southern England tell us about living with debt? Laurie Taylor talks to Ryan Davey from Cardiff University about his new book The Personal Life of Debt - Coercion, Subjectivity and Inequality in Britain, which tries to understand how debt affects people emotionally as well as economically.

Laurie is also joined by Sarah Kerr (LSE International Inequalities Institute), whose book, Wealth, Poverty and Enduring Inequality - Let’s Talk Wealtherty, investigates the stubborn persistence of inequality in the UK. Kerr argues that the gap between top and bottom earners has become entrenched and normalised across generations.

Producer: Natalia Fernandez

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28 minutes

Last on

Last Sunday06:05
BBC Radio 4

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Guests and further reading

- Sarah Kerr – Hallsworth Research Fellow at the University of Manchester.
“Wealth, Poverty and Enduring Inequality - Let's Talk Wealtherty” by Sarah Kerr (Bristol University Press, 2024)

Series 1 of Dr Sarah Kerr’s podcast Antisocial Economics, 'Talking about wealth.' ( with the LSE)

- Ryan Davey – Lecturer at the School of Social Sciences at Cardiff University
“The Personal Life of Debt: Coercion, Subjectivity and Inequality in Britain” by Ryan Davey (Bristol University Press, 2025)

Broadcasts

  • Tue 10 Mar 202615:30
    BBC Radio 4
  • Last Sunday06:05
    BBC Radio 4

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