Report – State of Social Enterprise

Social Enterprise UK has published a report into the state of social enterprise in the UK, providing a broadly positive overview of the sectors development in 2015. It’s quite comprehensive and draws out some interesting statistics on social enterprises, suggesting some differences between social enterprises and other businesses:

– 41% of social enterprises created jobs in the past 12 months compared to 22% of SMEs.

– The average pay ratio between social enterprise CEO pay and the lowest paid is just 3.6:1 – for FTSE 100 CEOs, this ratio stands at 150:1.

– 40% of social enterprises are led by women; 31% have Black Asian Minority Ethnic directors; 40% have a director with a disability.

The report also found that social enterprises tended to be based in relatively deprived places, claiming that 31% of enterprises “are working in the top 20% most deprived communities in the UK.” However, the authors suggest that the association with deprivation has weakened since 2013:

 

The report also looks at ‘business optimism’ in the sector and finds the most confidence in the South East and London: