The bar chart illustrates the percentage of budget that a student in the UK spent on different areas in 2 years, specifically in 1996 and in 1999. Overall, while most essential expenditures decreased, the majority of non-essential spending showed an upward trend. Moreover, student expenditures on recreational interests accounted for the highest percentage, compared to the other spending, in both periods.
In 1996, the UK student spent around 23% of the budget on accommodation payment, while food, bills, and household goods costed the student a smaller amount, approximately 20%. Spending on course tuition, essential travel and children was not significant, accounting for 10%, and less than 5%, respectively. However, in 1999, most of the essential expenditures experienced a slight decline, except for higher spending on travel, making up more than 5% of total expenses.
By contrast, there was an increase in the expenses of non-essential activities. Particularly, in 1996, the amount of money spent on entertainment purposes occupied more than 25% of the budget, and this figure continued to increase up to over one-third, which was much greater than the ones of the other portions. Likewise, other non-essenstial expenditures including consumer items and credit repayments saw a slight increase, from around 12% in 1996 to more than 15% in 1999. However, there was a little fall in non-essential travel expense throughout the periods.