Poverty in Europe
People at risk of poverty or social exclusion in the European Union
In 2017 the EU adopted the European Pillar of Social Rights and later in 2021 adopted the Action Plan for implementing the Pillar. This Action Plan contains three targets including the target that 'the number of people at risk of poverty or social exclusion* should be reduced by at least 15 million by 2030, including 5 million children'. This would result in reducing the number of people risk of poverty or social exclusion in the EU to below 76 million people by 2030, and children to under 18 million.
In 2022 the EU reported that there were 95.3 million people, or 21.6% of the total population. Ireland has a level of risk of poverty or social exclusion just below the EU average at 20.7%. Czechia (Czech Republic) has the lowest rate at 11.8% and Romania the highest at 34.4% (See European Pillar of Social Rights Social Scoreboard here).
In 2022, the at-risk of poverty rate*** for the EU overall was 16.5% of the population. According to the measurement used at EU level Ireland had an-at-risk rate of 14%. Czechia (Czech Republic) has the lowest rate at 10.2% and Bulgaria the highest at 22.9% (See European Pillar of Social Rights Social Scoreboard here).
In 2022, the severely material and social deprivation rate***** for the EU overall was 6.7% of the population. The rate for Ireland was 5.8%. Slovenia had the lowest rate at 1.4% and Romania the highest at 24.3% (See European Pillar of Social Rights Social Scoreboard here).
In 2022, the low work intensity rate** for the EU overall was 8.3% of the population. The rate for Ireland was 10.5%, the second highest rate in the EU. Luxembourg had the lowest rate at 3.5% and Belgium the highest at 11.5% (See European Pillar of Social Rights Social Scoreboard here).
*At risk of poverty or social exclusion, abbreviated as AROPE, corresponds to the sum of persons who are either at risk of poverty, or severely materially and socially deprived or living in a household with a very low work intensity**
**A household with a very low work intensity is the number of persons living in a household where the members of working age worked a working time equal or less than 20% of their total work-time potential during the previous year.
***Persons at risk of poverty have an equivalised**** disposable income below 60 % of the national median (middle) equivalised disposable income.
****Equivalised is a way of dividing the overall household income between those in the household to find an amount for each individual. A different weighting is given to different people in the household. For the EU, the first adult is given a weighting of 1.0, for all others aged 14 its 0.5 and for children under 14 the weighting is 0.3.
*****Severe material and social deprivation is defined as the proportion of the population experiencing an enforced lack of at least 7 out of 13 deprivation items (6 related to the individual and 7 related to the household).( See here for details of the 13 items).