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One in six Europeans living below the poverty line

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mwkruse
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Poverty News Blog: One in six Europeans living below the poverty line

According to the European Commission's annual social inclusion report, one in six Europeans lives below the national poverty line, while 10 percent of people live in households where there is nobody working, . Conducted in 2004, the study showed that 16 percent of EU citizens lived under the poverty threshold which is defined as 60 percent of their country's median income.

The poverty statistics ranged from 9-10 percent in Sweden and the Czech Republic to 21 percent in Poland and Lithuania while in all countries except the Nordic states, Greece and Cyprus, children are often at greater risk of poverty, said the study.

The report also found wide discrepancies in life expectancy between the bloc's member states and major differences in spending on healthcare with Estonia spending 5.5 percent of GDP and Germany spending 10.9 percent.

The average life expectancy of a man ranges from 65.4 in Lithuania to 78.4 years in Sweden while women in Romania have the lowest life expectancy coming in at 75.4 years, a figure that rises to 83.9 for their Spanish counterparts…..

Comments

2 responses to “One in six Europeans living below the poverty line”

  1. Virgil Avatar
    Virgil

    Well, that “poverty line” is often defined quite liberally by politicians. And also, what they see as “poverty” people in Europe see as perks. A 2 or 3 our siesta in Spain at lunch time that may not be paid is worth more to a worker than 2 or 3 hours of pay.
    At the same time, it may be possible that socialism may have something to do with the “not-so-well-off” status of many europeans. 🙂

    Reply
  2. Michael Kruse Avatar
    Michael Kruse

    You could speak better to these issues than I can. Poverty and income are slippery ideas. In the use about ten years ago, researchers determined that the poor were spending %125 of what they were taking in during a year. That has now shot up to nearly 200% of what they are taking in during a year. The poverty income calculations exclude non-cash benefits and studies also show that actual income is frequently understated. It is difficult to know what is happening in one nation much less make comparisons.

    Reply

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