Where is poverty highest in Europe?

The average poverty rate in Europe is 21% according to Eurostat, with the highest rates in Romania (32%), Bulgaria (30%), and Spain, and the lowest in Czechia (12%), Slovenia (13.7%), and Finland (15.8%). But the very lowest is in Russia (9.3%). / bne IntelliNews

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By bne IntelliNews August 19, 2024

In 2023, 94.6mn people in the EU (or just over 21% of the population) were at risk of poverty or social exclusion, reports Statista.

This means they lived in households facing at least one of three risks: income poverty, severe material and social deprivation, and/or living in a household with very low work intensity (where adults work less than 20% of their potential over the course of a year).

According to Eurostat data, this figure remained relatively stable compared to the previous year (95.3mn people in 2022, or 22% of the population).

As shown in the accompanying infographic, the share of people at risk of poverty or social exclusion varies significantly across EU countries. Last year, the EU countries with the highest rates were Romania (32%), Bulgaria (30%), Spain (26.5%), and Greece (26.1%). Meanwhile, the lowest rates were recorded in the Czech Republic (12%), Slovenia (13.7%), and Finland (15.8%).

For comparison, Russia recently announced that its fertility rate was “catastrophically low” at 1.4, well below the 2.1 rate needed to keep a population stable. However, Ukraine's birth rate has plummeted to 300-year low as country’s population collapses. These demographic problems have weighed on the poverty levels differently.

As reported by bne IntelliNews in its latest despair index – the addition of unemployment, inflation and poverty levels – Russia is currently enjoying one of the best despair index ratings in its modern history where poverty has fallen from 21.7% in 2020, according to Eurostat, to only 9.3% in 2023, Reuters reports – one of the lowest levels in Europe.

Poverty is hard to measure in Ukraine as few official statistics are being gathered thanks to the war, but Ukraine was already the poorest country in Europe before the war started. Just three months ago The World Bank estimated that around a third (29%, or roughly 9mn people) of the current population is living below the poverty line. According to The World Bank, an estimated 1.8mn more Ukrainians now live in poverty - since 2020; a situation that would be even worse had Ukraine not been the recipient of foreign aid to pay for pensions and salaries.