Families need £40k a year to live comfortably

Families need to earn £40,000 a year to have a decent standard of living amid the rising costs of childcare, transport and energy, a study has found.

Figures from the Joseph Rowntree Foundation show that each parent in a working couple with two children needs to earn £20,000 to fund a reasonable lifestyle, up from £13,900 in 2008. A single person needs to earn £18,400, an increase from £13,400 a decade ago.

The report said public transport has become much more expensive and bus services have been cut so that transport costs take up nearly a fifth of minimum household budgets.