Distribution of wealth in teenagers' language

As a part of the Business School's engagement with the recent ESRC Festival of Social Science, Andy Lymer led three seminars for School and FE College students. The sessions explored with more than 100 participants, ranging in ages from 14 to 18, a recent piece of research he and others in the Centre on Household Assets and Savings Management (CHASM) had undertaken on public understanding of wealth inequality and its impacts in the UK. With the visible (and subsequently consumable!) aid of piles of chocolate to demonstrate the perceived and actual levels of inequality in the UK, the groups explored the positive and negative implications of the current distribution of wealth. They discussed various options being touted in the media and by political parties for addressing the levels of wealth inequality. Responses to the sessions included - 'wish it had been longer!' at the end of the two hour session (chocolate influenced response perhaps?). The teachers involved reported it had 'provoked much subsequent debate' in their follow up sessions.