A leading academic has condemned the UK’s rental market as unsustainable, accusing landlords of profiting at the expense of low-income tenants. 

Richard Murphy, Professor of Accounting Practice at Sheffield University and a long-time advocate for economic justice, warns that rising rents are deepening inequality.

In a recent blog post, Murphy cites new figures from the Office for National Statistics showing that rental costs in England rose by 3% relative to gross incomes in 2023/24—the steepest annual increase on record. He argues this trend reflects a system where “wealth is being extracted from the poor to enrich the rich.”

Murphy calls it a blatant exploitation of low-income renters. and writes: “[Tenants] are not working for the sake of putting food on the table. They’re not working for the sake of having a good life.

“They’re working to pay their landlords. We should have got beyond this point now. We can’t live forever in a society where rents are literally dragging people into real poverty after tax and after paying for the essentials of living, where they cannot work out how to make ends meet.”

He insists it's time for the government to step up: cap private rents or build enough social homes people can actually afford.