Union warning over 'growing pay gap'.

Summary: Union leaders have warned of a growing pay gap between middle income earners and the super-rich.

Union leaders have warned of a growing pay gap between middle income earners and the super-rich.

The TUC said a national squeeze on wages was an "overlooked" factor in the financial crash.

Two-thirds of national wealth was spent on wages in 1975, but the figure has now slumped to 53 per cent, said the union organisation.

The TUC said UK society is now increasingly divided between the top 40 per cent and the bottom 60 per cent.

Stewart Lansley, author of the study, said: "For the last 30 years Britain's low and middle earners have seen their pay and living conditions stall while the incomes of the affluent, the rich and super-rich have vastly outpaced them.

"We now have an increasingly unequal society with growing income, wealth and opportunity gaps."

TUC general secretary Brendan Barber said: "The truth is that ordinary families have had their wages squeezed and have had to borrow money which should have been part of the wage packet instead.

"While the super-rich secured themselves a personal wealth boom on a scale not seen since Dickensian times - a direct result of the rising profits share - those on middle incomes slipped behind in wages and living standards."

Independent Television News Limited 2009. All rights reserved.

Independent Television News Limited 2009. All rights reserved.

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