Families with a households income of £100,000 are being left with ‘less than the minimum wage’ because of the hike in private school fees, according to new research.
Analysis from financial planning firm Saltus claims that the Labour policy of charging VAT on school fees means that wealthy families were being priced out of sending their children to private school.
The firm argues that for a family to send two children to private school and still take home average UK earnings, they would need to have a household income of £150,000.
A household earning £100,000 and sending two children to private school would be worse off than a couple earning the minimum wage but with no kids at private school, Saltus said.
The average annual day school fee in 2024 rose to £20,959 per child according to Saltus, increasing to £25,151 when VAT is added, meaning a family with two children at private school now face a yearly bill of £50,302 for tuition fees alone – all paid from post-tax income.
Saltus also found that the total ‘lifetime’ cost of sending a child to a private day school is now £476,399 – £94,486 more than before VAT was added – and £952,798 for two, £188,972 more than before VAT. Furthermore, Saltus research forecasts that from September 2026, to send two children to private school will cost a total of over £1million.
But if they were expecting to garner sympathy from the findings, it doesn’t look like they’ve got it.
Reacting to a Times article about the research, Jon Sopel wrote: “What a headline. It’s not compulsory.”
Someone else commented: “How about we f**k off all the private schools and solve this problem. Done.”
Another person sarcastically reacted: “Wow. ‘Families who spend most of their money won’t have much left’. Who would have thought?”
A fourth wrote: “There is an easy solution to that challenge then – send your kids to state school because you can’t afford the alternative and it won’t do them any harm whatsoever.”
“If I bought a Ferrari then I would take home less than minimum wage. If you want to write a story about me , get in touch,” another quipped.
Earlier this year, local councils in England said adding VAT to private school fees has had “no obvious impact” on applications for state sector places, suggesting that parents who could afford to send their child to private school could also swallow the higher fees.
When Labour announced last year they would be scrapping the VAT exemption on private school fees, critics had predicted this would prompt a mass exodus to the state sector, causing shortages of school places.
However, the fears were proven wrong when the latest year 7 application figures were released by councils.
These showed that more families have received their first choice of secondary school, with most councils saying they had seen no impact from the private school tax hike on applications.
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