Education. It’s one of the most significant dividing lines in politics. And Britain’s vote for Brexit threw full light on the worsening education divide that cleaves our society. Not every Leaver is poorly-educated, of course. About one in four of Britain’s university graduates opted to leave the EU, although curiously we haven’t heard much about them since the referendum. But, statistically speaking, if you have a lower level of formal education, then you were far more likely than your better-educated counterparts to have voted to radically shake up the existing settlement.
As the National Centre for Social Research points out, the average level of support for leaving the EU among degree-holders was just 26%. This compares to 50% among those with A-levels, 61% among those with O-levels or GCSEs, and a striking 78% among those with no qualifications. Almost every study of the Brexit vote since has confirmed that low formal educational attainment is a major predictor of whether or not somebody backs Brexit, just as it is a major predictor of whether or not people vote for populist, nationalist or Eurosceptic parties elsewhere in the world.
These voters have routinely been dismissed as ignorant, or as the ‘losers’ of globalisation. But they actually had very good reason to want to radically shake up the social settlement. Many were keenly aware that both they and their communities were getting a rotten deal. And this is especially true when it comes to the one thing that has a bigger impact on life outcomes than almost everything else: education.
When we explored the role of educational divides in support for Brexit with the Joseph Rowntree Foundation, we found that — often regardless of their own level of education — people were significantly more likely to back Brexit in communities that were ‘low-skilled’, where there were fewer graduates and less opportunities for them to get ahead. It is in these areas where people face what we call a ‘double whammy’: while people find themselves falling behind because of their own lack of formal education, this disadvantage is then compounded by a general lack of educational opportunity in their area.
Indeed, had Britain explored the state of educational inequality before the referendum, then the country might not have been surprised by the result. As the Commission on Inequality in Education has shown, during the 30 years before Britain voted for Brexit, regional inequalities in education were not only strong but had been worsening. Furthermore, these inequalities were often sharper than those seen in many other advanced nations, while poorer countries such as Latvia were actually doing better than Britain at reducing them.
It is areas that ended up voting for Brexit in the North East, Yorkshire and the Humber, the Midlands and Wales that were the hardest hit by education inequality. We’ve talked endlessly about how voters in these pro-Brexit regions were ‘misled’ by politicians or ‘manipulated’ by social media while ignoring the fact that they are on the receiving end of an increasingly inegalitarian education system.
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