Former industrial communities across Britain face “entrenched disadvantages” stretching back decades, according to the latest social mobility research.
The findings raise particular concern about the rising number of people between 16 and 24 who are not in education, employment or training (Neets), which was one in seven between 2022 and 2024.
The Social Mobility Commission’s state of the nation report also highlighted “extreme regional differences”, citing poorer childhood conditions, fewer job opportunities, less innovation and lack of growth in the hardest-hit areas.
The report said Yorkshire, the north-east, the Midlands, Wales and Scotland were still living with the impacts of deindustrialisation, describing “half a century of economic disadvantage and decline”.
However, it also identified “beacons of hope”, highlighting favourable conditions for future innovation and growth in Aberdeen, Brighton, Bristol, Cheshire West and Chester, Edinburgh, Oxfordshire, Reading, West Berkshire and Manchester.
Alun Francis, the commission’s chair, said economic opportunities had become “over-concentrated” in specific places, even with the positive signs in some areas.
“Entire communities, often in post-industrial, seaside towns have been left behind with deep-rooted disadvantages. This is the defining social mobility challenge of our generation,” he said.
The report – the largest collection and analysis of data on social mobility in the UK – notes that the proportion of young people securing professional jobs has grown, with 48.2% of 25- to 29-year-olds in such roles in 2022-24, up from 36.1% in 2014-16.
However, it also highlights a widening gap between those from more privileged backgrounds and those from working-class families who are able to access these jobs.
Women from less well-off backgrounds continue to find it harder to get higher-paid jobs than their more privileged peers, the commission said. The Social Mobility Commission is a statutory advisory body that monitors social mobility across the UK and makes recommendations relating to England.
International comparisons in the report show the UK sits alongside countries such as France and Japan in giving young people a strong chance to exceed the educational attainment of their parents.
It also found the UK had similar job mobility rates to those in other large western European countries, such as Germany and Sweden, where fewer people had moved into better-paid roles as growth in professional roles had slowed.
The annual report was published after the commission presented evidence to parliament last week on what success meant to people living in Britain today.
It found that respondents placed less importance on professional or managerial status, or earning a high income, than on work-life balance, job security and doing work they care about.
Health, physical and mental wellbeing, relationships with family and friends, education and social connection were rated as the most important measures of success. Owning a home and having savings were also valued, while many respondents said they did not believe life in the UK was “fair”.
The evidence also showed that class identity was viewed as “sticky”, with more than three in four people describing themselves as the same class as their parents.
While 53% of respondents identified as working class, fewer than a third were employed in occupations officially classified as such.
The research also found that those already at the top of the social class ladder were more concerned with climbing it than those at the bottom.
Economic power was increasingly important to younger people. Data from the Social Mobility Commission shared exclusively with the Guardian found that young people were more likely than older generations to define success as having a highly paid job.
More than half of 25- to 34-year-olds said this was important, compared with 28% of people over 65.
Younger people were also less likely to say professional success meant doing work they felt passionate about.
