# Minimum Wage in The United Kingdom Raised to £12.21: Can You Actually Live on It?


In April 2025, the UK’s National Minimum Wage rose to **£12.21 per hour**, the biggest increase in years. For full-time workers aged 21 and over, that adds up to **a monthly income of about £1,982.90**. Politicians called it a victory. But if you’re someone actually earning that wage, you might be wondering: Can I really live on this? 

This blog explores that question with data, real prices, real expenses, and real limitations. I looked at seven UK cities: London, Bristol, Manchester, Liverpool, Leeds, Exeter, and Coventry. Using cost-of-living data scraped from [*Numbeo*](https://https://www.numbeo.com/cost-of-living/), I built a monthly budget that reflects what it means to live like an adult, rent, groceries, transport, coffee, clothes, gym, and yes, a bit of social life. 

I wasn’t trying to model luxury or poverty, just normal life. The kind where you eat, pay bills, maybe stream Netflix, and hopefully save a little. This blog walks through what that lifestyle actually costs in different cities and whether someone earning minimum wage can afford it. 

Spoiler: In some places, barely. In others, not even close. It’s worth noting that London has its own recommended wage standard, the London Living Wage, which is set higher than the national minimum wage. As of 2025, it's £13.15 per hour. This blog uses the national minimum wage for consistency across cities. While London’s living wage would slightly improve the affordability picture there, rent and living costs are still high enough that the gap would remain significant.

**Data & Method**

To compare real costs with real wages, I scraped prices from Numbeo’s Cost of Living section for each of the seven cities. Numbeo is crowd-sourced, so prices aren’t perfect, but they give a decent average snapshot. The dataset includes prices for groceries, rent, transport, dining out, utilities, and other adult essentials. 

I wrote a Python scraper to extract these prices and then built a budgeting model. Here’s how I constructed the budget: 

* **Rent:** One-bedroom apartment outside city centre 
* **Utilities:** Electricity, water, heating 
* **Internet:** Unlimited broadband 
* **Groceries:** Milk, bread, rice, eggs, chicken, apples, cheese 
* **Transport:** Monthly public transport pass 
* **Food out:** One cheap restaurant meal per week + one mid-range dinner per month 
* **Drinks:** Four beers per month + 8 cappuccinos 
* **Entertainment:** Two cinema visits per month 
* **Personal care:** Shampoo, toothpaste, deodorant 
* **Clothing:** Jeans and a dress every 4 months 
* **Fitness:** Monthly gym membership 

Each item has a quantity, e.g. 12 litres of milk per month, and the cost is multiplied accordingly. The result is a detailed, realistic monthly spending estimate for a single adult. 

Then I calculated monthly income. At £12.21/hour, a 37.5-hour week adds up to 162.4 hours per month, giving £1,982.90 before tax. I compared this to monthly costs and calculated the surplus or deficit in each city. 

It's important to note that this income figure does not factor in deductions such as tax, National Insurance contributions, or student loan repayments, all of which further reduce take-home pay. Including these would only worsen the affordability picture. 

Additionally, I chose to focus on a single adult with no dependents or existing debts, to isolate the effect of minimum wage versus cost of living. This creates a simplified model that, while useful for comparison, does not reflect the full reality of life on low income. 

**Visual Analysis** 

**I. Monthly Expenses per City**

*Figure 1: Monthly Expense Breakdown by Category Per City*

This chart shows what your money goes to each month. Rent dominates, especially in London and Bristol. Groceries and transport are the next biggest chunks. Personal care, entertainment, and clothes make up smaller but meaningful shares. 

It’s clear that even without luxuries, adult life involves a wide spread of costs, and most of them recur every month. This visual also highlights how certain categories, like transport and personal care, may be underestimated in typical political debates about affordability. 

The stacked bar chart includes categories like rent, groceries, transport, personal care, and entertainment. Each bar represents a different city, broken into color-coded cost segments. Rent is clearly the largest expense in every city, often more than double any other category. In cities like London and Bristol, rent alone takes up more than 50% of the total monthly cost, while in places like Coventry and Exeter, it's closer to 40%. Groceries rank second across all locations, with transport typically falling in third. This breakdown gives a realistic view of how quickly everyday essentials add up. 

**II. Comparison of Income Vs Cost per City**

*Figure 2: Income Vs Monthly Cost per City*

This chart compares monthly income to monthly expenses. In cities like Liverpool and Coventry, income slightly exceeds costs. In Bristol, Manchester, and Leeds, the margin is razor-thin. And in London, the minimum wage doesn’t even cover the basics, the cost bar towers over the income bar. 

This visual is crucial because it lets us test policy claims. It's one thing to raise the minimum wage, but another to ensure it genuinely covers the cost of living, and this chart shows that the gap hasn’t closed yet. 

Each city is represented by two side-by-side bars: one for minimum wage income and one for total living cost. In Liverpool, Exeter, and Coventry, the cost bar stays just under the income bar, indicating a small but viable surplus. In contrast, London’s cost bar shoots well above the income bar, confirming a clear affordability crisis. The chart reveals that while the minimum wage may technically cover costs in several cities, it does so with barely any room to spare, and none to save. 

**III. Surplus or Deficit** 

*Figure 3: Surplus or Deficit After Expenses *

This chart visualises how much money is left after all expenses are paid. Green bars mean surplus, money left over. Red bars mean deficit. London is deep in the red. Most other cities show a modest surplus, typically under £300. 

It’s important to note: this doesn’t include savings, emergencies, or debt payments. The “surplus” isn’t spare cash, it’s your margin of survival. If you suddenly need to pay for new glasses or a train ticket to a job interview, that cushion disappears fast. 

Surplus and deficit values were calculated by subtracting total cost from minimum wage income. Liverpool shows the highest surplus of around £350, while London is the only city with a negative value, sinking nearly £500 below breakeven. Leeds and Manchester hover close to £100 surplus, showing that a single unexpected expense could push earners into the red. This bar chart quantifies how fragile minimum wage affordability is, even where it technically 'works.' 

**IV. Affordability Index**

*Figure 4: Affordability Index by City *

The affordability index shows what percentage of income remains after covering expenses. Liverpool leads at 43%. London drops to -20%. The rest hover around 10% to 25%. 

This gives a clearer sense of pressure: when you only keep 15% of your income, one surprise bill can tip you into the red. This visual also helps compare cities with different overall cost profiles by levelling the playing field with percentages. 

The affordability index is calculated as (surplus ÷ income) × 100. It creates a standardised measure to compare cities. Liverpool’s score of 43% suggests that nearly half of income remains after costs, while London’s -20% highlights a severe shortfall. This chart makes it easier to visualise how difficult or manageable life is on minimum wage across different UK locations. It also reveals how quickly the index drops once costs rise slightly, reinforcing how vulnerable low-income households are to even small changes in pricing. 

**V. How much percentage of Wage is consumed by Rent ?**

*Figure 5: Rent as a percentage of Income*

Rent is usually the biggest expense, so I isolated it. This chart shows rent as a percentage of income. Financial experts say rent shouldn’t exceed 30% of your income. In London, it’s over 80%. Even in Leeds and Manchester, rent takes up 40% or more. 

When housing eats that much of your budget, everything else, food, transport, health, gets squeezed. This chart is arguably the most important one in this project, because it points to the structural nature of the affordability crisis. 

This chart divides average rent by income for each city. In London, rent consumes over 80% of income, far above the 30% affordability benchmark used by housing experts. Even in cities like Leeds and Manchester, rent exceeds 40%, leaving little breathing room for other costs. Coventry and Liverpool come in under the 35% range, making them the only cities where rent might be considered reasonably affordable. This single statistic, rent as a share of income, strongly predicts whether minimum wage earners can make it work in each city. 

**Key Findings** 

This project reveals three major insights: 

**Minimum wage is enough, but only just, in some cities**. Coventry, Liverpool, and Exeter offer the best margins, with small surpluses after basic costs. 

**In mid-cost cities like Leeds and Manchester, the margin is thin**. The budget works, but just barely. There’s almost no room for savings or emergencies. 

**In London, the numbers don’t work at all.** Rent alone eats more than 80% of income, leaving a deficit even before you eat or take the bus. 

Across all cities, affordability closely tracks with rent levels. The lower the rent, the higher the surplus. The minimum wage might be national, but the cost of living isn’t, and that’s a major problem. 

It’s also worth highlighting that small policy decisions have big consequences. For instance, housing policy, transport subsidies, and childcare access all affect these budgets. So while this blog focuses on wages, the story is much bigger than hourly pay. 

**Conclusion**

This analysis shows that while raising the minimum wage is a positive step, it’s not enough to make life genuinely affordable, especially in high-cost cities. A full-time job on minimum wage only works when rent is reasonable. Once rent exceeds 50% of income, the rest of adult life becomes financially risky. 

It’s also worth remembering what this model leaves out: there are no dependents, no savings, no holidays, no credit card payments, no car finance, and no mortgage. In reality, many adults face all of those. If we included them, even cities with a surplus would likely tip into deficit. 

And it’s not just about survival. People on low wages should be able to participate in society, to have a coffee with friends, buy clothes when they need them, go to the dentist. This project shows that in too many cities, the minimum wage doesn’t allow for that. 

A livable minimum wage can’t exist in a vacuum. It has to be paired with housing policy, regional wage adjustments, and better support for core services like transport and childcare. Right now, the UK’s minimum wage might keep you above water, but only if you live in the right city, and only if nothing goes wrong.

**Reference List:**

- Cost of living. (n.d.). https://www.numbeo.com/cost-of-living/

- Low Pay Commission. (2025, March 28). The National Minimum Wage in 2025. GOV.UK. https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/the-national-minimum-wage-in-2025