119 million EU citizens at risk of poverty or social exclusion in 2015: Eurostat

Around 119 million people, or 23.7 percent of the population in the European Union (EU) were at risk of poverty or social exclusion in 2015, official data showed on Monday.

The proportion has managed back to its pre-crisis level in 2008, but it remains higher than its 2009 low-point of 23.3 percent, Eurostat, the statistics agency of the EU, said on the occasion of the International Day for the Eradication of Poverty.

According to the EU standards, there are three elements contributing to being at risk of poverty or social exclusion: at-risk-of-poverty after social transfers (or the so-called income poverty), severely materially deprived or living in households with very low work intensity.

Looking at each element, about one in six persons in the EU was at risk of income poverty, which means that their disposable income was below their national at-risk-of-poverty threshold.

This proportion has increased significantly compared with 2008, when it was recorded at 16.5 percent, according to Eurostat.

In the EU in 2015, 8.1 percent of the population were severely materially deprived, meaning that they had living conditions constrained by a lack of resources such as not being able to afford to pay their bills, keep their home adequately warm, or take a one week holiday away from home.

Looking at low work intensity, 10.5 percent of the population aged 0-59 in the EU lived in households where the adults worked less than 20 percent of their total work potential during the past year.

Among the 28 member states of the EU, three of them have more than a third of the population being at risk of poverty or social exclusion: Bulgaria (41.3 percent), Romania (37.3 percent) and Greece (35.7 percent).

The reduction of the number of persons at risk of poverty or social exclusion in the EU is one of the key targets of the Europe 2020 strategy. Enditem