CHASM Conference 2026: Contemporary Risks to Household Financial Security

In recent decades, responsibility for financial security has shifted away from collective institutions and onto individuals and households. At the same time, financial lives have become more uncertain, shaped by wage stagnation, rising interest rates, and a persistently high cost of living.

The CHASM Conference 2026 brings together leading researchers and policy experts to explore how financial insecurity is experienced across low- and middle-income households today. The programme addresses key challenges including precarious work, problem debt, housing pressures, and the growing impact of unpaid care and mental health needs.

Bringing together keynote insights and CHASM’s latest research, we will examine how these changes are experienced in practice and where responsibility lies for improving financial outcomes.

Keynote Speakers:

Matthew Soursourian
Senior Financial Consumer Protection Specialist, OECD

The Consumer Finance Risk Monitor 2026
Matthew Soursourian is a leading international expert on financial consumer protection and data-driven policy at the OECD. His work focuses on emerging risks in consumer finance markets and shaping policy responses to improve financial resilience across countries.

Abigail McKnight
Co-Director, Centre for Analysis of Social Exclusion (CASE), LSE

Quantifying Multiple Insecurities in Financial, Housing, Work, Health and Caring
Professor Abigail McKnight is a prominent social policy scholar whose research examines inequalities across income, employment, and wellbeing. Her work at CASE has been highly influential in shaping understanding of multidimensional disadvantage in the UK.

Conor Nakkan
Senior Researcher, Intergenerational Foundation

Closing reflections on risk, security and responsibility
Conor Nakkan’s research focuses on intergenerational fairness, with particular attention to how housing, labour markets, and public policy shape inequalities between age groups. His work brings fresh insight into long-term structural drivers of financial insecurity.

CHASM Speakers:

Louise Overton, Associate Professor of Social Policy and Director of CHASM
- Opening Remarks
- Understanding the Life Course Costs of Caring and Risks to Financial Wellbeing.

Kristian Fuzi, Research Fellow, 
- The Experience of Financial Insecurity in the Private Rental Sector

Maxine Watkins, Research Fellow
- Understanding the Life Course Costs of Caring and Risks to Financial Wellbeing

Mhairi Webster, Research Fellow
- First Jobs, Lasting Impacts: Scarring Effects of Precarious Employment in Youth Labour Markets

Carl Packman, Postgraduate Researcher
- The Gig Economy and the Individualisation of Risk and Responsibility

Adele Atkinson, Professor of Practice in Financial Literacy and Wellbeing
- Income Volatility and Debt Advice Needs