Working out who to spend Christmas with may be trickier than ever this year but at least paying for it will be easier for some.
Households built up an average of £7,100 in savings as lockdowns curtailed spending, taking Britain’s collective nest egg to £197 billion. Although millions suffered a fall in income, as jobs were furloughed or lost, the Centre for Economics and Business Research (CEBR), a consultancy, found that consumer spending fell at a sharper rate.
It said that average household expenditure would be 14 per cent lower this year than last and savings would be more than double. Based on figures from the Office for National Statistics, it found that Britons saved 10 per cent of disposable income in the first