The Birth-Year Deal
The deal youwere born into.
Drag to your birth year. See what university cost when you turned 18, what a home cost against pay when you turned 30, and when you can draw the State Pension. Then see why it changed and what would put it back. Policy built this deal, and policy can rebuild it.
Figures checked 27 Sep 2026Fees and homes: England · Pension age: UKSources
See it
Understand it
The decisions, in order
- 1998Tuition fees of up to £1,000 arrive in England.
- 2006The cap rises to £3,000.
- 2012The cap trebles to £9,000.
- 2021A typical home reaches 9.1 times earnings in England.
- 2022Income tax thresholds frozen, now until April 2031.
- 2026The fee cap reaches £9,790.
Fix it
Build homes to a real target
A binding housebuilding target, with the planning reform to hit it. More homes is the lasting way to bring prices back towards pay.
The trade-off
Existing owners accept more building nearby and slower growth in the value of their own homes.
Unfreeze the tax thresholds
Re-link the personal allowance and the higher-rate threshold to inflation, ending the silent rise that pulls more of every pay packet into tax.
The trade-off
The freeze is forecast to raise over £55bn in 2030/31. That money would have to be found elsewhere.
Charge graduates no more than inflation
Loans for courses since August 2023 already charge RPI only. Put earlier Plan 2 borrowers on the same footing, so balances stop outrunning prices.
The trade-off
A cost to the Exchequer, and it helps graduates rather than people who never went to university.
Sources and method
- House of Commons Library · Tuition fees in England: history, debates and international comparisons (CBP-10155, updated 8 July 2026): fee caps of up to £1,000 from 1998, £3,000 from 2006, £9,000 from 2012, £9,250 from 2017 and £9,535 for 2025/26, the first rise since 2017.
- Department for Education · Higher Education (Fee Limits and Fee Limit Condition) (England) (Amendment) Regulations 2026, impact assessment: the cap is £9,790 in 2026/27 and £10,050 in 2027/28.
- ONS · Ratio of house price to workplace-based earnings (Table 1c, median), released 26 March 2026: England, 1997 to 2025. Each year runs to September. 3.5 in 1997; 9.1 at the 2021 peak; 7.6 in 2025.
- GOV.UK · State Pension age timetable: 66 for people born 6 October 1954 to 5 April 1960, 67 for 6 March 1961 to 5 April 1977, 68 from 6 April 1978. The rise from 67 to 68 could change after a future review.
- House of Commons Library · Fiscal drag: an explainer (CBP-9687, 7 April 2026), using OBR March 2026: the threshold freeze raises over £55bn in 2030/31.
- GOV.UK · Student loans interest rates announcement, 10 August 2026: Plan 5 loans charge RPI only.
The fee card uses the cap in the calendar year you turned 18, the usual year to start a degree. Caps apply to full-time undergraduates in England; Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland set their own. The home card uses the England median ratio for the year you turned 30. Before 1997 there is no ONS figure, so the card shows 1997 and says so. The pension card gives State Pension age by year of birth; within a few years the exact age depends on your birthday, and the card says where.