The average weekly pensioner income in the UK at the end of the financial year in 2022, after the deduction of direct taxes and housing costs, was £349, according to new statistics from the government.

This represents a £27 a week decline compared to the end of the financial year in 2021.

In the Department for Work and Pensions' latest Pensioners Incomes Series for the financial year 2021-2022, the government said that the average income had increased by £14 a week since 2010.

Between 1995 and 2010, the average weekly income for a pensioner rose from £176 to £335.

The report also stated that at the beginning of April last year the average income for pensioner couples was £515 per week, which was more than twice that of single pensioners, who had an average income of £239 per week.

On average, pensioner couple incomes were lowest in Yorkshire and the Humber, and the North East, where incomes were 9 per cent below the UK average.

Pensioner couples in the South East had the highest average income, at 15 per cent more than the UK average.

Benefit income, which includes the state pension, was the largest component of total gross income for both pensioner couples and single pensioners.

This was 56 per cent for single pensioners, while for pensioner couples it was 38 per cent.

Older pensioners in couples (over 75) also had lower incomes that younger pensioners in couples on average, last year, with the former receiving £322 a week, and the latter pocketing £389 a week.

Conversely, however, the average income for single pensioners aged under 75 was £234 per week, while the average income for single pensioners aged 75, or over, was £243 per week.

Pensioners over 75 were also more reliant on benefit income. For pensioner couples whose highest earner was over 75, 51 per cent of their income was derived from benefits.

For those whose highest earner was under 75, only 39 per cent of income was sourced from benefits.

Income from earnings, meanwhile, made up 7 per cent of total gross income for single pensioners last year. For pensioner couples, 16 per cent of total gross income was from earnings.

Couples that contained one adult below state pension age made up 24 per cent of all pensioner couples. For this group, earnings income made up 36 per cent of total gross income.

For couples where both partners were over state pension age, this was only 8 per cent.

“We may have seen a bit of a blip in pensioner incomes this year with them slightly down on last year’s figure, but overall incomes are on the up," commented Hargreaves Lansdown head of retirement analysis, Helen Morrissey.

"Pensioner households make up a bigger percentage of households in the top fifth of income with less in the bottom fifth than there were back in 1995.

"Earnings income appears to be a key driver with younger pensioner households better off than their older counterparts. This could be because one partner remains below state pension age and continues to work full time. Those households with earnings income received on average £371 per week, which significantly boosts incomes.

"However, occupational pension income was the most important factor in increasing incomes making up 40 per cent of the incomes of those households in the top fifth of income distribution compared to just 10 per cent of the income of those in the lower fifth for whom benefits income made up the overwhelming amount of income.

"We may be seeing incomes rise but gaps remain. Average weekly incomes for single pensioners stand at £239 per week - far less than half of the £515 average income enjoyed by pensioner couples. Single women also tend to have less income than men and are more reliant on benefits such as the state pension. Over time auto-enrolment will boost the number of people saving as well as the amount saved and help incomes to rise but there is still some way to go.”

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