Eurostat, the statistical office of the European Union

E2: Environmental statistics and accounts; sustainable development

e-mail contact : ESTAT-SDG-MONITORING@ec.europa.eu

The indicator is part of the EU Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) indicator set where it is used to monitor progress towards SDG 1 on ending poverty in all its forms everywhere, which is embedded in the European Commission’s Priorities under 'An Economy that works for people'.

SDG 1 calls for an eradication of extreme poverty and for a reduction of relative poverty by 2030. It envisions shared prosperity, a basic standard of living and social protection benefits for people everywhere, including the poorest and most vulnerable.

Furthermore, the indicator is included as a secondary indicator in the Social Scoreboard for the European Pillar of Social Rights and the EPSR Action Plan, and is part of the multidimensional poverty index. It can be considered as part of the global SDG indicator 1.2.2 "Proportion of men, women and children of all ages living in poverty in all its dimensions according to national definitions".

Poverty and social exclusion harm individual lives and limit the opportunities for people to achieve their full potential by affecting their health and well-being and lowering educational outcomes. This, in turn, reduces opportunities to lead a successful life and further increases the risk of poverty. Without effective education, health, social, tax benefit and employment systems, the risk of poverty is passed on from one generation to the next. This causes poverty to persist and hence creates more inequality, which can lead to long-term loss of economic productivity from whole groups of society and hamper inclusive and sustainable economic growth.

The indicator measures the share of population living in households that spend 40 % or more of the household disposable income on housing ('net' of housing allowances). Housing costs include rental or mortgage interest payments but also the cost of utilities such as water, electricity, gas or heating.

% of population
i. total
ii. below 60% of median equivalised income
iii. above 60% of median equivalised income

Calendar year.

From 2021 Regulation (EU) 2019/1700 foresees the requirements relating to geographical coverage, detailed sample characteristics, including subsampling, in accordance with Annex III, common data gathering periods, common standards for editing and imputation, weighting, estimation and variance estimation.

Before 2021 onwards EU-SILC is based on a common framework defined by harmonised lists of primary and secondary variables, common concepts, a recommended design, common requirements (such as imputation procedures, weighting, sampling errors calculation) and classifications aiming at maximising comparability of the information produced. Details can be found in the metadata of the source datasets.

ESS (SILC)

Data source: Statistics on Income and Living Conditions (SILC).

Data provider: Statistical Office of the European Union (Eurostat), based on data reported by the countries.

Every year

The Indicator is updated annually in November. Complete and updated ESS data release information can be accessed via Eurostat release calendar.

T+1 year

New data points are disseminated within one year after the reference year.

All EU MS

Data are presented for all EU Member States plus Iceland, Norway, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, North Macedonia, and Türkiye.

All EU MS

Data are comparable between all EU Member States respectively other presented countries.

> 10 years

Presented time series (including EU aggregates) starts in 2010.

> 4 data points

Length of comparable time series without methodological break is longer than 4 data points.

Analysis of indicator is presented in Eurostat's annual monitoring report on Sustainable development in the EU (progress towards SDGs in the EU context).

See table  sdg_01_50

Eurostat dedicated section on SDGs: http://ec.europa.eu/eurostat/web/sdi/overview

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